


A Taste to See if the Lord is Good

by chanting_lotus



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Pirate, Aziraphale Has a Praise Kink, Brief mention of prostitution, But Not Between Our Boys, Come Eating, Dirty Talk, Insecure Aziraphale (Good Omens), Jealous Crowley (Good Omens), Lord's Son Aziraphale, M/M, Minor Character Death, Non-religious Aziraphale, Overstimulation, Painplay, Period Typical Attitudes, Possessive Crowley, Power Bottom Crowley (Good Omens), Praise Kink, Rape/Non-con Elements, Scene Gone Wrong, Service Top Aziraphale (Good Omens), Underage Prostitution, crowley has a silver tongue, disposable demon's name is Jinn in this, end of sex tags, kind of, no blood or anything like that, oh boy dirty talk, okay sex tags now, promise its not, reads like a shitpost, you cannot change my mind
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-14
Updated: 2020-08-04
Packaged: 2021-03-05 02:14:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 24,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25266694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chanting_lotus/pseuds/chanting_lotus
Summary: One, this reads like a shitpost (tags and all) but kind of goes serious in the story.Two, you are out of your mind if you don't think that Aziraphale has this exact plot in a ten-cent book from the Industrial Revolution period tucked away in one of his old, Grecian trunks scattered around the bookshop.--excerpt:Aziraphale does not respond. The man strolls over to the bed, folding himself down onto it and crossing his legs. “I wonder how much your daddy will pay for you.”“Nothing.” It slips out without him meaning to.“Oh?” He cocks an eyebrow. “What makes you so sure?”
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens), Beelzebub/Dagon (Good Omens), Hastur/Ligur (Good Omens)
Comments: 19
Kudos: 97





	1. Chapter One

Summer at the manor was always an affair. The gardens would bloom heavy and fragrant, the colors radiant along the walkways. More servants would rush in for the beginning of the social season, cleaning out the bitter cold that persisted into spring. New tapestries from the mainland were displayed. Trunk after trunk of fine, silk clothes were paraded to the family.

This summer, the season was put on hold. Aziraphale’s brothers were allowed a reprieve from the war to come home and say goodbye to their mother. He sits in the garden while they talk to their mother. The colors are almost unreal.

Aziraphale had been here in the winter and spring as his mother’s cough worsened, as her lungs gave out and filled with blood. He stayed because the general had told his father that he did not have the constitution for war. It has given him a better advantage than either of his brothers, a chance to cry quiet into his bedspread. A chance to be thankful how far his father set his rooms away from the rest of the family, if only to give him months to collect and cycle through his grief.

The summer sun is setting, looking far closer to the wall, reaching over and casting red shadows down the cobblestone paths, when Gabriel comes out. Aziraphale looks at the difference between them. How tall and sturdy his brother is, how proud his jaw and strong his brow. There is an angry red that lines the outside of Gabriel’s eyes, the only suggestion that he is not a perfect fighting solider. He doesn’t think it makes his brother weak. He wonders if the roles were reversed, should Gabriel stumble on him post-weep, would he be judged? Would his battalion, should he ever had had one, recoil from his tears?

Aziraphale believes the general that came to see them. He was not built for battle.

“How is she?” Aziraphale asks. Between the two, he is more likely to know better. He never left their mother for a mainland war, for mainland glory. To bring glory to his father’s name.

Gabriel looks off to the orange hue that is left behind from a hidden sun. It looks like an accidental smudge of brightness on a night sky canvas. A mistake. “The doctor says she’ll pass before the night.” Gabriel does not wring his hands or tug at his hair. He shows no outward sign of weakness, no tremble to his voice. “She wishes to see you, before it’s over.”

“Of course.” Aziraphale moves to stand. “Michael?” If Michael was saying his goodbyes, Aziraphale would wait out here. The eldest took to their father too much and was quick to catch onto the apathy he showed Aziraphale. Michael mimicked it well.

Gabriel shakes his head. “Talking to father.”

The old tapestries, still richer than what their peasants would ever see, hung around the walls of the manor. The coats of armor, tucked away ancient weapons, medals and plaques all sit a heavy layer of dust. Most of the servants curl up in their familial, peasant cottages during the winter. Their mother would be the one to send for them, would set the season to order, but she is sick.

Aziraphale wonders if it will fall to him now. If he has already failed at his first task, what he was meant to take the mantle of when there was still hope for their mother. Wonders, if his father wasn’t forever locked in his study, surrounded by the only books in the manor that Aziraphale is not permitted to leave, if he would be upset at Aziraphale.

Their mother has not left her bed in weeks. She’s set up in an eastern room, enjoys seeing the dawn each morning. Her bed is placed next to the window. There is a fire, in spite of the warm breeze that winds its way across the room. One of their few servants attends to it, attends to her.

She does not turn to say hello when the creak of the door and the scrape of wood on stone calls out his presence. Aziraphale walks over to her bed. There are small rags littered on her bedspread with blood staining them, the smell of decay lingers. He takes the seat next to the bed, watches her thin face smile up to him.

“Hello, mother.” Aziraphale says, throat tight. He smooths some hair from her head. He promises to remember her as she was before—more delight than person. More light than anything else in his world, streaming into his soul and bringing him peace.

Her palm flips over to ask for his hand. The bones in her palm press hard on the soft of his flesh. “Aziraphale. My darling youngest. My sweet, gentle boy.” She sighs. “You are too gentle for this world, I fear sometimes.”

“I’m sorry.” He isn’t sure what to say. It does not sting, not like it would should his father say it. She means it as a genuine worry, a tug on her lip and crease to her eye.

“That is no fault of your own, my darling.” Her voice drags out hard. She struggles to breathe. “Will you promise me something? Promise me that when the time comes, if you ever have a choice, choose happiness. I wasn’t given the choice, daughter of a lord. Maybe you will.”

His mother trails off, lost in thought. Aziraphale could agree with her now but she would not hear him. It was more common for her, in the hard days of present, to turn her eye to the past. He wishes that he’d asked her before she fell ill for more about her. A parent always seems so constant to a child until they are not. At which point, they’ll never be constant again.

There are not enough servants to send to him in the night. Aziraphale knows that at some point, while the moon hangs fat and heavy in the sky, his mother will pass to the next life. He does not sleep. Instead, he watches the stars, how they twinkle and shine and move slow and sure across the night sky.

He goes down to breakfast; Michael and Gabriel are there in their elaborate uniforms with rifles strapped to their sides. They hover next to their father’s chair, talking in low tones with him. Gabriel nods to him when they turn to leave. His eyes are clear. There is little time for grief with a war going on.

Breakfast is a quiet affair. His father never found Aziraphale to be favorable when set up against either of his brothers. It was an acceptable arrangement when he received affection from his mother. Aziraphale is mindful of what he eats, knows his father thinks he is too soft. He leaves half of his plate full and mourns for it. Etiquette states that he shouldn’t leave the table until the lord of the manor has dismissed him, so he stays seated.

“Aziraphale.” His father’s voice is as cool as spring on the western isles. He does not wait for a response. “It’s time we discuss what you’re meant to do in life. You will inherit no lands here, as the youngest of three. You are not skilled in fighting, like Michael, or leading, like Gabriel. I have always feared the stain you might bring to our name with your lack of ambition.”

Aziraphale sits quiet. He isn’t sure what he expected from his father, but for him to have set his eyes on casting him off like a shadow is not it. “There is much honor in a son of the Old Religion. A good sight away from me and a way to allow you to find likeminded men.” His father finishes his cup. “It’ll be good for you, child. Plenty of the monks love the tomes of the Old Religion, and we’ll both not have to worry about how you’re meant to give me grandchildren.”

The reminder sets shame into Aziraphale’s cheeks. He will not argue or defend himself now. There was a promise, a long time ago—when he was much younger—that what his father caught him doing in the whorehouse would never be repeated. This is as close as they’ve come to discussing it.

“When am I set to leave?” Aziraphale asks.

“A merchant ship will take you to the mainland tomorrow. I thought of sending you with Gabriel and Michael, but they’re going to the thick of war. Your route is much safer.” He says it like he has done Aziraphale a kindness.

“Thank you, father.”

He spends the day getting what small affairs he has in order.

There is little point in packing many clothes for the journey. He settles on twelve outfits, enough to get to the mountain chapel where the monkhood takes in new children. Once he is there, they will take his finery and give him a wool robe. it will be heavy enough to protect him from the winter chill that never leaves the mountain chapel.

The Old Religion has deep roots in the mainland. On the isles, on Aziraphale’s isle, it is seen as more of old crockery. Science has become the new religion. It is stifled out with the belief of an all-seeing, all-knowing being who never speaks to them. The only reason it would cause his father pride is that the isles still must pay dues to the mainland. And those that profit the most from those dues are the king and the church. Aziraphale will have to learn more about it, will have to learn how to believe.

The merchant vessel is a small one, carrying more information than physical cargo. He watches some of the boat men lift up crates of cotton, the only thing that grows well on their island in the summer. The hot sun bears down on them, on their thin shirts that press against the hard line of stomach from sweat. His throat swallows and Aziraphale casts his eyes elsewhere.

He is grateful that the robes will keep his eyes up and away from the other monks.

His father does not come to see him off, even electing to bypass their last breakfast together. The only thing that Aziraphale regrets is how he will not be there to witness his mother go down into the earth. He hopes they bury her somewhere peaceful, with lots of trees. She would have liked that.

The captain shows him to his room, has a younger boy drag Aziraphale’s trunk in after him. It is a small area but it is manageable. He wasn’t allowed to bring book or scroll with him. That he was to learn how to live without frivolous pleasure, on the seas before entering the chapel.

He’s left alone for dinner. A small soup, heavy with potatoes and carrots, makes its way to his door. Aziraphale adores cooking and wondered what the kitchen was like. It must be small, but was it safe to have a flame close to the wood of the boat? Or was it protected by brick?

Aziraphale does not each much. He is fortunate not to be seasick, a trait learned at a young age of an isle lordling. The food does not interest him because his thoughts are focused on the future.

He wonders what the food will be like in the monkhood. Will there truly be others there that would rather spend time with a good book than with a broadsword? Will he have to stay in the mountain chapel for the rest of his life? Will he choose how he lives as a monk? Will they let him cook, let him read? If he does it in the name of the Old God?

These thoughts protect him from his biggest fear: if he were to be discovered as peculiar in his tastes, what would the Old Religion do to him? It is the moments when he is gripped with terror that he wishes he had read more of their stodgy book. If not for the good material within, at least to understand what the people base their laws off of. He’s thought to ask the crew if any of them have it, but perhaps they don’t know why he is headed to the mainland. Perhaps, if he told them, they would know his father sent him away.

The first night is spent in a fitful sleep. The waves outside are louder than the thoughts in his head, but they aren’t the same as the cricket-calls in the garden. They do not lull him the same way. There is the crash and quiet of the sea, startling him as he begins to slip away each time.

He spends the second day on the walkway of the ship. It pinks his skin, too delicate to even spend time in the sun. It is a clear day and they’ll reach the mainland in two more days, slip along its border up to the desired port. The wind is quick and the captain thinks that he may only have to sleep on the ship for three nights, even if the usual is four. Aziraphale can tell that he wants to be thanked for the news, thinks it is good, and does so.

That night, he is served a small cut of chicken and piece of fresh bread. The smell of the bread is able to entice him. Aziraphale falls asleep earlier and easier this night.

He is awoken by a lurch, falls from the bed onto the hard, wooden floor. There is shouting above him, there is the sound of gunshot. Aziraphale scrambles to his wall, puts his trunk between him and whatever comes in.

When his door breaks down, there are two men who step in. They hold new guns, rifles that can fire two shots before needing to be cleaned and reloaded. Only generals have that kind of gun, currently. He’d read that it was too expensive to produce. The butts of the guns are thick. He knows who they are then. Pirates.

It doesn’t do him much good. They still use the butts to knock him soundly out.

He comes to in a much nicer, much, much larger cabin. He’s got his wrists tied to a post behind him. In the corner of the cabin, his trunk sits. Aziraphale is not foolish enough to think this is his new living space, mostly because he can see another’s clothes strewn up on the bed.

His arms grow weary in their forced position, his tongue heavy and head aching. If there wasn’t a pounding in his head, he might have taken a nap. If there wasn’t a terror pulsing his heart along its path, he might have taken a nap even with the pain.

There comes a sharp rap on the door, like someone was knocking. A rap to the tune of mockery. It swings open and in steps a man.

Aziraphale is glad he could blame anything he did on how badly his head hurt. This man is…lovely, is the only word that came to mind. His hair is braided down his back, thin strands falling out of the braid. And his hair is a fiery red, almost too bright to be real. It looks more like the flowers in his garden than hair.

His eyes are amber, gold, a beautiful yellow. Aziraphale has never seen eyes like those before. The man wears kohl around them and has an ear full of earrings. Aziraphale’s blood thickens for a moment, like a sugared tea, then heats and melts away anything that did not allow it to race. To race along towards this man, stretch his entire body, every hair and fiber, to him.

Frankly put, he is beautiful enough to make Aziraphale so hard that he shifts up his legs. It may have been seen as weakness, but as long as the man didn’t catch what it really was, then Aziraphale will count it as a win. He is already known to be weak.

“Welcome back to the land of the living, sunshine.” Oh, god, his voice.

Aziraphale does not respond. The man strolls over to the bed, folding himself down onto it and crossing his legs. “I wonder how much your daddy will pay for you.”

“Nothing.” It slips out without him meaning to.

“Oh?” He cocks an eyebrow. “What makes you so sure?”

Aziraphale stays silent. His lips are dry, desert parched as the southern islands, skin peeling. He didn’t notice until now, now that his skin feels too awake to be ignored.

The man leans forward, his loose, billowing shirt exposing a toned chest. Aziraphale goes dizzy. “Come on, sunshine. We’re going to ransom you if you don’t give me a good enough reason not to.”

He doesn’t want to think of how they might wrangle out his father’s name. “I’ve been sent to join the monks of the Old Religion, so he doesn’t have to look at me.” Let the man draw whatever conclusions he wants, Aziraphale thinks. A smaller part of him thinks, _let him draw the right conclusions, let him know me._

“Harsh.” The man says. “Though who’s to say you’re not lying to me?”

There were no papers that were sent with him about joining the monks. He could ask to be delivered to the farmer who travels up the mountain with crop, his next companion on his journey. But the pirates would never dock at the mainland, not that close to the war. He’d place a small sum on the fact that this boat could be identified as a pirate ship. “You could ask the merchant ship’s captain.”

A flash of white from the man’s teeth. It’s a slow smile, curved like a cursed blade. His lips look soft and smooth. “Dead.”

Aziraphale sits quiet for a moment. He isn’t sure how else to prove that he is not wanted by his father. Would it be more preferable to send money so your son could finish his way to the mountain chapel, or to keep the gold and get rid of the man you’ve been trying to since birth?

“I’m not sure if there’s another way to prove…” Aziraphale looks down, red splotching his cheeks.

“That’s quite a dilemma, isn’t it, sunshine?” The man clicks his tongue and sighs. “You got any skills? Besides looking pretty? I’d take you just for that, keep you in my bed, but the crew needs a reason to not cut you throat to groin.”

What Aziraphale’s body should respond to is the threat of disembowelment, but a sharp heat shoots through him at being this pirate’s kept thing. He curls his toes in his shoes to keep himself focused. His knowledge might be useful to the pirates, but he knows very little on the sea. They probably wouldn’t care to know about all the types of plants in his garden.

“I can cook.” Aziraphale says.

“You can cook?” The man asks.

“I’d preferred the kitchens over my father’s table. The chefs thought it better that I make myself useful if I were to be in the way.” Aziraphale pauses, looks up through his eyelashes. “It’s not as if my father would have them punished for treating me like a servant boy.”

“That’s a good skill to have, sunshine. We’ve need of a new chef.” He leans closer still, chest a few inches from Aziraphale’s knees. The man has his feet planted wide, one arm supporting how far off the bed he’s going to get close to Aziraphale. “Last one was tossed over for mutiny. You don’t look like the treasonous type, though.”

“I’m not.” Aziraphale promises, throat dry. His entire body feels dry, feels cracked, like a single match or even just the slightest friction could set him ablaze. Burn him to ash.

The free hand of the man comes out to grip Aziraphale’s cheeks. He tries not to flinch at the contact, tries not to lean into the calloused, large hand. “You look like you enjoy a nice meal. I’d bet your food is divine.”

The mention of his soft frame makes Aziraphale shrink in towards himself. He knows how he appears—too plump to make war, too indulgent to be a lord’s son. The man makes that clicking noise again. Aziraphale is certain that it’s a small language to the man, thinks that he could learn it given enough time. “It’s a compliment. I rather prefer someone with meat on their bones, especially in the kitchen. Let’s you know they love their work.” He wets his lips. “I also prefer it in the bedroom. Much better than a bunch of bones clanging against each other.”

His scalp must be red, Aziraphale thought. It felt like the heat of his blush had traveled his entire body. Why this man would continue to flirt when Aziraphale knew how he looked? All tomato red, splotchy.

A rough thumb presses against his cheekbone before the man retreats. “I’m glad that’s settled. We’ll work out the amount of time you’ll be here for your debt.” Aziraphale must look confused, for he continues. “The debt where I don’t let the crew kill you, sunshine. Though, I’d say it was a shame. Such a pretty thing wasted to the sea. Maybe your time here will be short because of my favor.” There is a hungry look in his honey eyes, one that promises that it could be longer because of his favor.

But there would be time spent on this pirate ship. That is settled. He wonders if his father will receive word when Aziraphale does not make the next point of travel. He wonders what his father would say if he knew that he was playing chef to a pirate ship. It cools the heat inside him.

The man slides off the bed, producing a small blade. Aziraphale presses himself against the post he’s tied to him. A terror, a remembering of who stands in front of him, trussed up to look like the best meal at the banquet. He only uses it to free Aziraphale’s hands. “Name’s Crowley. I’ll be your captain, during your stay on the good ole Hellsbane.”

“I’m Aziraphale,” He responds. Crowley seems a fitting name for the man before him.

“Is that your real name?” Crowley asks, tucking away his knife. Aziraphale nods and Crowley groans. “First rule, sunshine. Don’t tell anyone your real name. You’re going to make enemies on a pirate ship. They might sell you out to mainland guard or find your family and gut them. Pick something that’s easy and that you’ll take to being called.”

“Ezra?” His mother called him that when he was young.

Crowley shakes his head. “Too close. I’d suggest sunshine, but I’d rather keep that for myself. What about…Z?”

“Just Z?”

“It’s short, it’s got your weirdest letter, and you’ll probably respond to it.” Crowley points out.

“Okay, I guess.” Aziraphale says. Crowley stands up and offers Aziraphale a hand.

“You’ll have to wear your lord’s robes for a little longer. We’re set to stop at a port, and we’ll trade ‘em in for something more durable then.” Crowley turns to the door. “Let me show you the galley.”

“What’s a galley?” Aziraphale comes out the door with him. They’re at the end of a hallway, stairway leading to the top deck. His feet find steady purchase easy on the rocky sea. The crew could taunt him for his frame, for his status, but not for how he moved on the ship.

Crowley laughs, snaps him out of his thoughts. “It’s a kitchen on a ship. Galley is what it’s called.”

“Ah, yes. Then I’d like to see the galley, please.”

“You’re rather posh for someone who’s going to be on a pirate ship. Try to loosen up a little.” Crowley knocks his shoulder and Aziraphale steadfastly does not think of all the ways he could loosen up.

They make their way up to top of the ship. There are people bustling around, though none as fine looking as Crowley. Many have open sores or grime on their face. Aziraphale schools himself to not to show how disgusting he thinks that it is. He’d hate to get cut up for such impolite thoughts.

“Hastur and Ligur,” Crowley gestures to two men that are pulling ropes attached to the ship’s sails. “Dagon.” The woman is patching up cloth. “Beelzebub.” Sat at the helm was a person, who was too far to determine gender, holding tight to the wheel. “They’re my first mate.”

“Ah.” Aziraphale is not well-versed in ship terms. He assumes it means that this Beelzebub was important.

“We’ve got a couple others, too. Focalor, Amon, Jinn, Lilith, Moloch, Baphomet, Enma. Couple others cycle through when they’ve need for some gold.”

“Are we all demons on this ship?” Aziraphale knows enough mythology. Some of those names came from far away countries, floating too big to be an isle or island of the mainland. Too large to be claimed as part of them.

“Z isn’t a demon.” Crowley says. “Besides, it’s a theme. Hellsbane and all that. Also, Crowley isn’t a demonic name.”

“You’ve got a fair point,” Aziraphale says. It’s easy to talk to Crowley. Easier still when he’s free to move about. They make it to another set of stairs and go down them. Aziraphale follows at a sedated pace, clutching the salt-warped wood that makes up the wall. It’s nice to have something steady under his palm, even if he doesn’t have need for it.

The inner bowels of the ship holds cargo, barrels and boxes and hanging bags that drip onto the floor. “What is that?” Aziraphale asks of a grey bag swinging. There’s a pool of wet on the bottom of the bag.

“Cheese, I think.” Crowley sniffs at it. “Yeah, I think it’s cheese.”

“Wonderful.” Aziraphale says. What he means is that he’ll never touch it. At the end of the cargo, there is a door. It swings open with a shove. Inside is a small kitchen—galley. There is a countertop that lays like an island in the center of the room, two ovens and a stove pressed onto a wall. Brick lines the back of the wall.

“You’re welcome to use whatever’s in this hold. If you find us lacking, write up a list for the port.”

“How’d you know I can write?”

Crowley lowers his eyes. He’s slightly taller than Aziraphale, and it sets a warmth through Aziraphale. “Sunshine. You’re a lord’s son. Of course you can write.”

“My brothers can’t.” His father didn’t think it was a necessary pursuit. Aziraphale was able to learn because his mother saw the desire he looked at for books and hired a tutor.

“Pity them.” Crowley says dismissively.

When Aziraphale steps through the door, he notes the pots and pans which hang from the ceiling, and under the countertop are several chipped bowls. There is a cabinet above the stove, and when he opens it, it reveals a paltry number of spices. There is plenty of salt, however.

Crowley allows him to wander around and familiarize himself with the galley. When Aziraphale comes full circle, he clicks at him. “Well, I’ve work to do. I’ll send one of the boys down to fetch the food for the crew in a few hours. You can come back to me with our bowls, so I can see if you’re an investment worth the trouble.”

He saunters out of the room before Aziraphale can think up how to respond. There is a distant, “Enjoy cooking, sunshine,” before the sound of boots hit the stairs and he is alone.

Aziraphale turns on the oven first, fetching wood from the corner to keep the flame from the oil going. The metal will need a moment to heat. It is a newer stove, but he isn’t sure if this means a newer ship or timely improvements. He spends that time sorting through the various crates and barrels. There’s some red meat that doesn’t look like it shriveled up two years ago, still has some give to it. He plucks out the beef and carries it into the galley.

In another crate is a various medley of potatoes, onions, peas and carrots. Though the potatoes and carrots seem few and far between. There’s also some mold on the outer skin of the vegetables. Aziraphale grabs them anyway, carrying them to the countertop and starting to peel off the bad from the good.

He puts the meat in the oven for a few minutes. After it is warmed, he divides and drops it into two bigger pots and allows the heat to leech out any juices it might still have. It’s barely enough to cover the bottom of the pots. He spoons water into the pots, brings them to a boil, and dumps the vegetables in as well. There’s more onion than anything. He’ll have to ask for cabbage, a hambone and cabbage soup would go a long way on a ship.

While it boils away, salt and a dash of pepper sitting on the film on top, Aziraphale looks for the infamous sea biscuits. It’s impossible for a ship to survive without them and so he rifles though each crate carefully. He finds them in a barrel, a canvas sack protecting it from the wood. He takes out double what he needs.

Aziraphale is sweating at this point, but it is a good sweat. The first hour was an exercise in finding balance with his feet and hands. His feet sway with the boat but he needs a steady hand for the knife.

The bowls come out and he finds plates on the opposing side of the counter. He takes them out as well. He might have to clean afterwards, might be the cook’s job as well. But presentation is important. And he has to prove to Crowley that he’s worth the investment.

At the thought of the captain, Aziraphale feels hot for an entirely different reason. He thinks on his sharp smile, his toned chest, his hair. The way Crowley knew him, knew what he was, on sight. Knew that it was safe to lean close and whisper filthy nothings into his ear, lick a metaphorical tongue along his spine and entice him. Aziraphale has to adjust himself before he continues working.

The bowls are put on the plates and are framed by two pieces of sea biscuit. Aziraphale ladles some soup into each bowl, ensuring that some meat and potato fall into each bowl. He stops at fourteen, thinks that’s how many are on the ship, and waits for the other pirate to come collect the food.

He has no way of telling time, but surely it would be dinner time soon. Crowley walked him down here around high noon and he had taken up an awful amount of the captain’s time.

A young man, much younger than Aziraphale—who is only shy of thirty—comes down to the galley. He’s much better kept than those that Aziraphale saw up deck, but his clothes are a mess. His lip is split but his skin is clean.

“Hello.” Aziraphale says. His voice ticks up because he’s nervous and he has no idea the proper protocol when you meet a fellow pirate. Oh, and to be called a fellow pirate.

The man looks at him. “You the new cook?”

“I am,” Aziraphale reaches out a hand, his name on the tip of his tongue. “Z.”

He doesn’t take Aziraphale’s hand. “I’m Jinn.”

“Hello, Jinn.” Aziraphale smiles a little too bright. “I wasn’t sure how many were aboard, so I only made fourteen.”

“There’s fifteen here. Kept one of the boys from the merchant ship—besides you.” Jinn says. He wipes a gloved hand across his mouth and it resplits his lip. The glove comes away a little bloody.

“I’ll make another bowl, then.”

“No need. He won’t be eating tonight.”

“Why not?” Aziraphale asks.

Jinn shrugged. “Captain seems to think that he’s got valuable information. He doesn’t take too kindly to beating, so starving it out of them is how we usually do it.”

Aziraphale is…grateful, is the closest approximation, that Crowley believed him when he said that his father would pay little for him. Though he could take comfort that he would not have been struck.

“Would you like some help carrying up the food?”

“No, captain says he’s got need of you. Take his food and I’ll get the rest out.”

“Of course,” Aziraphale begins to set up the pots for overnight stay. There’s enough left, in his desire to make a good impression, that they’ll be able to have a small breakfast off of the leftovers.

He picks up two of the plates, the weight making the soups easier to transport, and inches up the steps. The sun is setting to the west, making the sea look like someone has set fire to it. It sweeps Aziraphale up for a moment. He stares until a rough wave jostles the ship and he stumbles.

The deck has more people on it than earlier. Dagon mans the wheel, and Aziraphale looks around for Beelzebub. He spots him, her, them looking away from the sun and towards the eastern horizon. They’ve their foot propped up on the helm on the ship. Their face turns to him as if they could tell he was staring, an angry burn splintering half of their face.

Aziraphale hurries across to the other set of stairs.

He’d be able to pick out Crowley’s quarters even if it wasn’t where he came from. The door is polished a deep wood, unlike the doors before it. It sits at the end like a man at the head of his table.

Aziraphale raps on the door with his elbow. It is a small sound, could have been drowned out by the sea around them. Crowley opens up before he can think too hard on it. “Sunshine. How’s the galley?” He moves to let Aziraphale in. His feet are bare besides a pair of stockings that he wears under his pants, shirt unbuttoned to a distracting degree. Aziraphale hurries to the table he saw earlier that day.

The table has had some things removed from it. There’s a stack of books on the edge, a couple of empty glasses and a bottle of rum. Underneath it all is a well-worn map. Aziraphale settles their food on top of the map, as far into the mainland as it goes. Pirates have no need for directions on land.

“It’s acceptable.” Aziraphale says.

“Oh, acceptable.” Crowley responds in mirth. “High praise from the lord’s son.”

“Don’t call me that,” He doesn’t feel like a lord’s son, covered in sweat and two-day-old clothes.

Crowley comes over to the table, pours them both a finger of rum, sprawls into his chair. “Why? Everyone here knows you’re highborn. It’s in your gait, sunshine.”

Aziraphale sits into his seat, back straight. Crowley waves his glass at him.

“See—that’s what I’m talking about. You act like a prissy lord, but you would be traveling on a much bigger ship if you were one. So, the crew and I are able to tell you’ve got to be a lord’s son.” He drinks down his finger, fills up his glass again.

Aziraphale pushes a plate towards Crowley. He won’t say that he wants to know what the captain thinks of his skills. “My father never thought highly of me. If I were given the choice, I’d choose not to be known as just his son.”

“Sad story.” Crowley says. “My parents sold me to a whorehouse when I was nine.”

“Good Lord,” it slips out incredulous. Aziraphale isn’t sure how to respond. “Surely, that’s much too young—I mean,”

“It’s fine, sunshine. And there are plenty of men and women who like to see a young thing between their thighs.” He speaks with a forced air of casualness. Crowley takes a sip of the soup, savors it. “It’s good.”

“Thank you.” Aziraphale pauses.

“I think I’ve figured out our arrangement.” Crowley moves away from his past like it was a simple footnote. Like it does not define him, or harm him, or remind him. “We’ve usually the next three months planned out in advance. Your ship was just good opportunity.”

“Ah.” Aziraphale doesn’t know how to feel about that piece of news. He settles on neutral.

“Hellsbane is meant to take the current to a small isle north of here. It’s got a port that looks the other way when it comes to sea folk. We’re to stop there and get our supplies for the next several months. Make sure you’ve given me whatever list you’ve got before then.”

“What does this mean for me?”

“You’ll be on for our next route. We’re headed around the mainland, to the southern islands. Your ship had something that will be paid handsomely for down there.” He’s vague, being open without saying what all is happening. “So, about four months? Before we’ll be somewhere that you can be dropped off.”

“The southern islands are in rebellion, though.” Aziraphale says, dipping his sea biscuit in the soup to soften it.

Crowley matches his movements. “That doesn’t concern sea folk. We’ve always been in rebellion, sunshine. Loyalty goes to the highest coin.”

Four months. Four months on the ship. It sounds like four months of freedom and Aziraphale should be less than thrilled to be here. He eats slowly, watching the captain. He’s terrified of the crew but feels safer here. Safe that he won’t be gutted. Less sure about his chastity.

“Do all the crew eat alone?” He wonders if he’ll be expected, when Crowley doesn’t have want of him, if he’ll eat with the others.

“Not usually. Were they not on the deck when you came across?”

“They were, but Jinn hadn’t brought out food yet.”

“Good that they sent Jinn. He’s less intimidating than most, makes him good at his job.” Crowley says.

“What does he do?”

“He’s the one to keep watch over the prisoners.” Aziraphale thinks on what Jinn said about the ship servant. “Puts them more at ease, not to see someone like Hastur or Beelzebub watching over them.”

“Yes, I can see how Beelzebub would frighten someone.” Their long burn, like a twisted strike of lightning, was alarming for the few seconds Aziraphale saw it. “Say, I have a hard time telling what Beelzebub is… I’d hate to offend.”

“Beelzebub doesn’t care what you call them,” Crowley says as he pushed away the plate. He stands up and circles around the table. Aziraphale carefully puts down his spoon, sits away from his food and puts his attention on the captain. “The only reason you’ve got to know what’s going on inside their britches is if you want to get in them. Do you, Aziraphale?”

Crowley puts his weight on the table, hip cocked towards Aziraphale. His mouth dries out. “I don’t think you do. I can’t imagine anyway who’d want someone that nasty.” He shifts his body in front of Aziraphale, who moves his chair back to give him space. “No, you’re the type to prefer a more defined person.”

Aziraphale keeps his eyes steady on Crowley’s face.

“I know your type, sunshine.” It sounds like he’s saying, _I am your type, sunshine._

A hand comes out to touch his hair. It sends tingles down to the soles of Aziraphale’s feet. “I can’t.” He tries to sound steady. “It’s not proper.”

Crowley snorts and doesn’t let go of his hair. “If you don’t want to be seen as a lord’s son, don’t do what daddy always tells you to do.” His hand tightens “Who cares about proper on a pirate ship? Who’s going to run and tell the lord? Who could stop us?”

His hand slides sure down Aziraphale’s temple. Aziraphale is certain that he cannot move, that he could not stop if he wanted to. He doesn’t. “If you have no desire, I’ll stop, sunshine. I like my bedmates willing. But I can read you like a book—you’re being sent to make vows never to fuck again because word got back to your daddy that you like something harder than cunts. Prefer the stable boy to the kitchen maid.”

Aziraphale shuts his eyes. He can feel the salt-skin, calloused and sure, pressed against his lips. It takes all of him not to taste. “Did your bedmate run back and tell him? Or did he catch you, sunshine? All red and wanting?” His voice drops deeper. It’s got gravel in, got silk in it. “I won’t tell him. Won’t leave you wanting, if you let me.”

“You’re—you’re talking me into it.” Aziraphale admits. His trousers are tight again, the feeling that he stays hard around Crowley.

“Good.” Crowley says. “Do you want me to describe what I’ll do to you? Or more, what I’ll let you do to me?”

Aziraphale groans. The way he dresses, the affects he keeps around him, most would not assume his preferences. Crowley had a keener eye than anyone he’d met. “Or do you want to show me?” Crowley asks, knee knocking against Aziraphale’s.

He’s sold.


	2. Chapter Two

The bed groans some when Aziraphale shoves Crowley on it. The captain fights against him, does not expect the strength hidden beneath the weight. Aziraphale had been told that he’s equipped with the ability to fight, if he could only find the constitution. 

He holds Crowley down with one hand, looks at him. “You’re strong.” Crowley says,   
eyes tracking him. 

“Is it favorable? Here?” The only time he had the chance to do this, he was left cold and unfinished, rebuttoning his clothes in his father’s carriage. 

“I’m not complaining.” Aziraphale uses his grip to take off Crowley’s shirt, letting him rise for a moment before putting him back down. 

They wait for Aziraphale to decide how to proceed. He uses his other hand to undo his belt, a hiss coming from Crowley. It drops away with a clang. “You’re rather observant, you know that?” 

Crowley laughs, a breathy sound that vibrates under Aziraphale’s hand. “The first compliment you give me and it’s not about my looks? I must be getting old.” 

“You’re no older than me,” Aziraphale frowns. “And it is a compliment. You’re right…about how my father found out.” 

“That your bedmate told him? Not surprising, considering your father fills his coin purse.” Crowley pauses. “No, that’s not what you meant. He caught you in the act. Oh, sunshine.” The softness in his voice makes Aziraphale loosen his grip on Crowley’s chest. 

“Was it your first time?” Aziraphale’s face flushes hot. He knows how he wants this experience to go, but he didn’t get to the—the main course, per se—the first time. “You’re in for an experience, then. We’ll do something easy tonight.” 

Crowley squirms under him, rolls himself on his belly. He’s got a tattoo on the nape of his neck, going down his spine. It’s a black serpent. It sits coiled in an intricate symbol. Eye catching, but in his shirt, only the tail might be seen. The eyes stay large and unblinking on the middle back, where ribs meet spine. 

“You still want?” Aziraphale asks. He can’t force the whole sentence out, to ask if Crowley still wanted him.

The captain reaches to a dresser, opens it and produces a jar of yellow-tinted liquid. It looks like cooking oil. “Of course, sunshine. Get out of your clothes.” Crowley drops the sealed jar on the bed, works as quick as he can on his trousers while being held down by Aziraphale’s thighs. He’s as wiry and thin as a snake, perhaps why he chose to get such a tattoo. 

Before he moves to get off his shirt, he plants a hand onto the tattoo, puts some pressure. Crowley moans beneath him, spurs him on. Aziraphale would press harder, would break his wrist and Crowley’s spine, to keep that noise coming.

Aziraphale has to get up for a moment to shuck off his pants. He watches Crowley pull off his own, watches him get up on his knees. Crowley’s cock hangs between his thin thighs, long and red, curved somewhat to the right. Aziraphale wants to know if it tastes as pretty as it looks. 

“Come on, you can fuck my thighs.” Crowley says, shoving his ass higher. “It’ll be good, and we’ll work up from it.” 

Aziraphale climbs back onto the bed. His body feels too light, like his bones have gone as hollow as a bird. The beat in his chest is as frantic as a bird wing, perhaps he is changing. 

Crowley opens the jar, dips his fingers in it and does his best to reclose it. He sets it on the dresser, and Aziraphale worries only for a second that a harsh wave might crash it to the floor. 

His fingers are wet enough that they begin to drip on his bedspread, a deep grey color that shows the discoloration. His cock stands proud while he watches Crowley slather the oil along his inner thighs. Crowley puts some on his cock as well. Aziraphale traces his hand over the tail of the snake. He wants to push his fingers into the red hair, inches from his nails, really pull at it and drag a noise from Crowley. 

Then he reaches a hand past himself, onto Aziraphale. It causes Aziraphale’s hips to jerk and his fingers to tighten on the back of Crowley’s neck. A moan gets muffled by the pillows that Crowley’s face is planted in. His cock is slick and is pulled by Crowley to his thighs. Once Aziraphale is trapped between the soft flesh, Crowley closes his thighs hard. 

“Oh, that is exquisite,” Aziraphale says, moving shallowly. He’s afraid to put too much force between them, afraid of Crowley’s thin frame breaking. Even if it is a lovely mental picture, the idea of bunching Crowley up so hard that he’s nowhere to go, he’s to be an object of pleasure forevermore. A little pain is different than shattering, so he stays careful. Crowley can moan over a tight hand, some pressure, and not want that.

“More, sunshine.” Crowley pants underneath him. Aziraphale can feel Crowley’s cock on the drag of his head out. “Do me the favor of a little more.” If he’s asking for it, even with the nervous twinge in his gut, who is Aziraphale to refuse?

Aziraphale puts his hand on Crowley’s shoulder, the other firmly on his thigh. He uses them for leverage as he manhandles Crowley. The first slap of flesh on flesh is loud, almost as loud as Crowley’s answering cry. 

“Good, it’s good.” Crowley says. “I can just imagine how’d you be in me—so thick and hard. Bet you’d leave bruises all over me, for days.” 

He slams Crowley back again. He wants to get his hand on the other’s cock. Crowley’s started to make little grunts in sequence to every thrust. 

Aziraphale sits back on his haunches, uses his hands to pull Crowley up onto his thighs. This way, he can look down and see Crowley’s leaking cock, the way red has spread up his body, the way his nipples have peaked. One hand winds its way around Crowley’s throat and the other goes to his cock. 

He lifts Crowley up by the throat, letting gravity do the rest of the work. 

Crowley holds onto his forearm with both hands. “Wonderous, sunshine. You’d be wasted to the waves. Wasted to that monastery. You could stay here—in my bed—keep your dick wet on me. Keep me full of you.” 

“You’ve got a mouth on you.” Aziraphale grunts. A heat builds in his stomach and his cock starts to leak. It falls onto Crowley’s thighs. 

“It’s not the best thing my mouth can do. Just wait and see, I’ll show you what good is.” Aziraphale tightens his grip on Crowley’s neck. He makes a high whining sound, cut off with the air, and comes messily across his bed. Aziraphale works him through it, never stopping with his fucking. 

Crowley’s chest rises and falls quickly, body loose. Aziraphale lets go of all of him besides his thighs, forcing them tight. Crowley leans forward some. He’s boneless now that the tension is gone. 

The oil makes a squelching sound every time Aziraphale moves through it. Obscene but arousing. His pleasure builds steady and spikes with the wrung-out sounds that come from Crowley’s throat. As bright as the sun reflecting from the waves, as demanding as the ocean’s pull. Most of his come lands on Crowley’s thighs. 

“Wasn’t expecting you to hold out.” Crowley says as Aziraphale manhandles him onto his front. 

“Wanted to make sure you got what you wanted.” Aziraphale responds. Even if he never finished with someone before, he’s cognizant about himself to know that. If given the chance to bend himself to his partners liking, it would serve better to arouse than anything else. 

He scoops some of his spend off of Crowley’s thighs, oil as well, and offers it to him. Crowley looks at it. “You said you had better things your mouth could do.” 

He takes the fingers into his mouth, wraps a tongue around them, sucks and moans and some spit drips from his lips. Aziraphale is not as young as he once was but is enough for his cock to give a valiant effort. He wants to push farther in, wants to choke Crowley on him. Instead, he withdraws. 

“Would you tell me my bunk is not in the galley?” Aziraphale asks, making move to put on his clothes. 

Crowley groans. “Knew I forgot something. Just stay here tonight—your stuffy clothing is already in my room.” 

“It’s not stuffy. It’s the height of fashion.” Aziraphale says. He remembers the way the other pirates looked at him as he walked across the deck. A hunger, but not for sex. An envy that whipped at him like the wind. “When do we get to that port again?” 

“About two days. You wouldn’t have to even change out your clothes, if you didn’t want.” 

“I can’t keep clothes on for four days straight.” 

Crowley smiles, eyes already closing. Apparently coming makes him tired. “Who said anything about you keeping them on?” 

\--

When they step into the town that the port is based in, Aziraphale realizes the market is the square. These folks, so north of the mainland, really do not care where business comes as long as it does. 

The list he had made for Crowley is shuffled over to Beelzebub, who takes Jinn, Hastur and Ligur with them. Crowley’s got his hands full with Aziraphale’s clothes. Aziraphale also carries a load. They’d left one outfit back in his trunk, with reasoning that Crowley was enamored with the outfit and he’d need a trunk anyhow. 

He lets Crowley lead. The crew disperses into groups, but none follow them. 

“I’ve noticed you aren’t close with the crew.” Aziraphale says, in a halting way. Careful like steep steps down an unknown mountain. 

“’Course not. They’re a bunch of backstabbers.” Crowley talks matter-of-factly. They take a sharp turn on the market, past a pub and blacksmith. “Most of them were involved with the chef but none will talk.” 

“So why do you work with them?” 

“Listen, sunshine. Almost all pirates will chafe under a captain. It’s the way of sea folk, none of us like keeping to another man’s laws. If I refused to work with anyone that won’t at least try to usurp me, then I’d be sailing Hellsbane solo.” He cuts his eyes down to Aziraphale, who tries not to trip over his own feet. “Maybe’d I’ve a kitchen wench to keep my belly full in more than one way.” 

“Crowley!” His cock jerks at the filthy words, but he darts a glance around. Aziraphale feels like his heart is beating too quick. Wonders if this feeling, so pervasive around Crowley, will send him down to the grave early. “There could be others present.” 

“It’s a port town that takes in sea folk. They’ve seen stranger relations than the likes of you and I.” There’s a woman, dark-haired and plump, who sees them walking by and waves. “Florence.” Crowley calls out. “I’ve got some things that might suit your fancy.” 

“Of course, monsieur Crowley.” She says, affecting the foreign word in exaggerated tones. 

“I wasn’t expecting to hear that language this far north.” Aziraphale trails after Crowley into Florence’s shop. 

Crowley clicks his tongue. It seems to be nervous habit. Perhaps he only does it when he’s irate. Aziraphale struggles to make sense of the uncharted language, no book to guide him besides the one Crowley makes of himself. It is often closed. “Florence doesn’t actually know it—she just uses a few words to piss me off.” 

“You don’t like it?”

“Much too posh, in my opinion. If you want to sound like you’ve broken your nose when talking, get punched.” Crowley says. Florence’s shop has stacks of cloth folded along the walls. There’s a table in the center and Crowley tosses Aziraphale’s clothes onto it. 

Aziraphale follows suit but stacks them much neater. They deserve respect, even if he’s not to keep them. Florence begins picking through the clothes, unfolding and shaking them out. Crowley steps back and allows her to do as she is doing. After a few hums and sighs, she looks back to them. “I’ll give you a fair shake—these ten outfits for fourteen of mine. You’ll also bring me chocolate from the southern islands.” 

“How did you know where we’re headed?” Crowley asks, eyes siltted. His shoulders go tense and Aziraphale’s gut goes cold. It’s the first time that his mind has screamed predator at him, in regard to Crowley. He goes still. 

Florence shrugs. “Je ne sais pas.” 

Crowley groans, spell broken for a moment. “Don’t use those fucking words on me, Florence. Was it one of my crew? I’ll pay for a name.” 

“You just told me, captain. I took a guess, considering how all your guns are being tempered by Josiah for humid weather.” Florence says. “And I’ll use what words I please if you want anything from me.” 

“We could just ransack you.” 

Aziraphale looks between them. He knew that Crowley would do general plundering and thieving, but he had hoped to stay on the ship during it. Florence laughs, stacks his clothes into a large pile. “You ransack one port town and no other will take you. Have fun starving, if that’s the way you want to go.” 

“Fine.” Crowley grinds out. “We’re using your backroom so he can try things on.” 

Florence waves her hand, approval given. She looks to Aziraphale, looks at him like his tailor might have. It is disorienting in the current context. “If you get anything on the clothes, anything, it becomes one of your fourteen.” 

She takes some of the last reminders of who Aziraphale was to her desk, pulls out a quill. It shocks him that she can write. 

Crowley grabs cuts of cotton and denim off the shelves at random intervals. They know each other well enough that the lay-out of the shop is probably known, but it makes no sense to Aziraphale. Once his hands are moderately full—the fabric is less fine, less thick than his lord’s clothes—Crowley moves them to the backroom. 

It’s a small area, full of cloth wheels and a loom. There’s a dusty mirror propped up. Aziraphale doesn’t look different than when he left his father’s home, but he certainly feels it. There’s a slight pink on his nose, flaking off to make freckles. 

Crowley hands him outfit after outfit. They mostly fit him. 

It’s light colors, a faded tangerine or salmon shirt, a pair of tan pants. They complement his complexion well. Crowley starts to sort them into two piles. The last outfit he hands to Aziraphale, he talks as well. “This is the original outfit. Every pirate should have one that makes others think, ah, that’s a pirate.” 

Aziraphale frowns. “But I’m not a pirate.” The pants are black, and the shirt is white. It’s got a wide vee for the neck, ruffles along the sleeves. There is a certain style to it, one he’s sure Crowley would be able to handle effortlessly. When it comes to fashion, when it comes to body or appeal, Crowley seems to always be more than capable. 

When he’s got on the ensemble, Crowley hooks his hands onto Aziraphale’s hips. “As long as you’re on my ship, you’re a pirate.” The shirt does not make him look swollen, as Aziraphale feared. The pants give his legs the appearance of not being stumpy. “And what a magnificence pirate you look like.” 

“Truly make others afraid of the dread pirate Z?” Aziraphale chuckles. 

“More like make them unbearably hard,” Crowley’s hands move down his front, cup him in his trousers. He isn’t too hard, but it changes quickly while under the tender mercies of his captain. “Make them think, now there’s someone that could rip me apart and I’d thank them.” 

Crowley undoes his pants, pulls out his cock, and Aziraphale’s brain goes from enjoyment to panic. “She could come in,” Aziraphale says and tries to move out of Crowley’s grip. He isn’t using all of his weight behind him and Crowley holds onto him by the hand on his hip. It’s not a true fight. He wants to be convinced. 

“Florence knows what I’m doing, why I asked for the backroom.” 

“Do this often, do you?” And it shouldn’t splinter like it does. It’s a queer feeling coupled with the hot hand on his length. Of course, a pirate who looked like Crowley would bed a lot of his hostages. 

“Once or twice.” Crowley kisses at his neck, soothing the hurt. He does something divine with his hand. Aziraphale goes tense all over from it, bites the inside of his cheek. “Back when I was young, back when I was the pirate getting his clothes. First time bringing someone since I was a captain, though.” 

It pleases him, inordinately. Aziraphale moans and lets Crowley manhandle him. Lets him pull and tug and twist, gives up any pretense of control. He looks at himself in the mirror, high flush on his neck and traveling upwards quick. His arms are tucked up to his chest, ruffles falling in such a way to show off his plump wrists. There’s a line of wetness around his eyes. His mouth is damp, shines from the lamps. 

What sends him over isn’t seeing himself in the mirror. It’s seeing Crowley. Crowley’s skin is as pale as it ever is, hand working quickly over him. His face is focused, hungry and open. Crowley cuts his eyes up to Aziraphale’s in the mirror. 

Aziraphale comes hard enough to see stars move. 

Crowley catches it all in his palm, careful with the backroom and his clothes and waits for Aziraphale to gather his breath. When he does, Crowley brings his hand up to his mouth. “Clean up your mess, sunshine.” 

\--

The crew are more at ease when Aziraphale is dressed in his new clothes. Jinn will speak to him for a few moments before taking out the others’ food. Beelzebub nods to him on his walk to Crowley’s rooms. Dagon’s spoken to him a few times. Each time a conversation starts, Aziraphale bounces on his feet, surprised and delighted in turn. 

Crowley does most of his ship work in the morning, manning the wheel and repairing rope. He cleans the deck like his shipmates, repairs the wood and patches the sails. The early shift lets them share dinner each night. 

Tonight, Aziraphale has made a meat medley of sorts. It is pickled beef and refried beans, baked together to make protein stretch a little father. The dried beans were the best choice that Aziraphale made. They keep well and cook slow throughout the day. He feels pleased with himself, and it must show on his face for Crowley’s even more indulgent. 

They’ve had some red wine with the meal. Crowley procured it when he learned it was Aziraphale’s favorite, and this is the first time they’ve had it. 

“You should fuck me tonight.” Crowley says. 

It’s only because the wine is a good vintage, and they aren’t pulling out of sea for at least two months, that has Aziraphale swallowing his drink rather than spitting out. “I’d assumed that’s what we were doing.” 

Crowley clicks his teeth. Aziraphale is beginning to understand how he does it, too, might learn how to imitate it. “No, I mean, really fuck me. Put your dick in me.” 

“Language.” Aziraphale mutters. He knows that it won’t change Crowley’s tongue. It’s only a problem when Aziraphale is aroused—which is all the time around Crowley. Stokes him higher, makes him remember how crass the man he’s with is, how dirty he’s willing to be. How he could pull him down and show him something that no one is a manor hall would dare think on. “I don’t want to hurt you.” 

“You couldn’t.” Crowley sips his wine, unbothered. “Or rather, I wouldn’t let you.” 

Aziraphale still hesitates. 

Crowley knows this game now. It’s the same two-step dance they do each time he tries to convince Aziraphale to do something. The first step is one back by Aziraphale, followed by a pull and drop from Crowley. A reason to drop. “Come on, sunshine, put your trust in me. Don’t you want to know what it feels like? I want to know what you feel like.”

The idea, reminder of the heat of Crowley’s thighs, his hands, what it would feel like inside him. Crowley leans forwards like he knows he’s got him got. 

“There’s ways to ease into it, if you’re scared of going fast enough to break me.” He smiles. His teeth are so white. “Though, personally, it’s always better with a little of that fear.” Crowley comes around the table, reminiscent of their first night, and Aziraphale sits up. Crowley settles his weight on his thighs. 

“I’m all for your strength.” He says, unbuttoning Aziraphale’s shirt. Aziraphale puts his hands on Crowley’s hips, slides them up to feel skin. “For your frame. Makes me feel breakable.” 

“And you like that?” Aziraphale asks. He pulls Crowley’s body down to grind onto. Crowley is already interested, a hard line on his stomach. Aziraphale shoves himself out more to give more friction. 

“There’s nothing better than feeling like you’re conquering something that could destroy you, sunshine. Why’d you think I became a pirate?” 

“Money.” 

“There’s a lot of that, too.” He pulls off Aziraphale’s shirt, hands moving fast and sure. They kiss, neither knowing who started it, and Crowley begins to play with his nipples. It draws sounds from Aziraphale, whose mind is melting under the heat. A tongue to his chest has him hitching breath, has his hands crushing Crowley’s thighs. “Are you going to take me to bed?” 

Aziraphale sighs like he’s put on upon. “If it’s really your preference.” Crowley knows he’s joking, and it’s only punctuated by the fact that Aziraphale keeps him wrapped around his waist as he stands. 

“Fuck, sunshine.” Crowley’s hands dig into his shoulders. “Bet you could fuck me standing.” 

“I could.” He weighs eight stone soaking wet, or at least that’s how it feels to Aziraphale. 

Aziraphale puts one hand on Crowley’s backside, to keep him up, and puts the other in his hair. He wore it down today and it had been distracting Aziraphale all throughout the meal. Like Crowley didn’t know he’d bury his fingers into it. He grabs a fistful of hair and pulls. 

“Oh,” Crowley groans out long and loud. “Oh.” The sound goes straight to Aziraphale’s core. His entire body is melted steel, softened and then hardened for a new purpose. To drag that sound from Crowley. 

He feels his thighs hit the bed and he releases Crowley, full stop. Crowley bounces some on his landing. “You know I haven’t done this before.” Aziraphale says. He can act all bravado, but that doesn’t beat knowledge. 

“Watch me then.” Crowley pulls himself up. “I’ll be your teacher. Now, get on the bed for me, sunshine.” 

Aziraphale follows the order, lets Crowley manhandle him until he’s laying down. Crowley works off his pants. “One day, I’ll put my mouth on you. Show you something even more heavenly than the Old Religion.” 

He isn’t religious, but the blasphemy still does something for him. Aziraphale’s cock beads up with some precome. He clutches at the blankets, like they’ll keep him from making Crowley go through with his promise effective immediate. He wonders how Crowley would respond to him pushing his head down, pleading and begging, body jerking to be given what it wants. 

Crowley crawls up him, sits himself on Aziraphale’s round stomach. He tries to avoid looking, wonders what Crowley thinks of it. He doesn’t have to wonder long. “Perfect. You’ve got the perfect body to cushion me, to let me bounce on.” 

His chest is pink, and it spreads. It’s a warm flush. Less urgent than the heat of arousal. The warmth comes from his heart, though he’ll keep careful not to say anything. Pirates, Aziraphale fears, don’t really go in for emotions. It’s still nice to know that Crowley finds pleasure even in his appearance. 

“Get me the oil, will you?” Crowley asks. Aziraphale has to twist some, almost upending Crowley, to get his hands to the drawer. It’s right inside. He unscrews it for Crowley, holds it out to him. “Good, sunshine.” 

The praise makes his cock jerk, hitting up onto the wiry skin of Crowley. “Oh, you like that, do you?” Crowley asks, delighted. “Good to know.” 

He coats his fingers in the oil again, waves it away and Aziraphale rescrews it. Focuses all his attention on the man above him. Crowley reaches behind himself with his fingers, and the sight is so erotic that Aziraphale can’t breathe. A small grunt escapes Crowley’s lips. He feels like he’s going to come on the spot. How people manage to get to the main show, he doesn’t know. 

“Usually, I like to take this part slow. It’s enjoyable to feel yourself loosening up a little at a time. But forgive me for being a little impatient tonight.” 

“You’re forgiven.” Aziraphale says unthinkingly. 

Crowley huffs out a laugh. “Start with one finger and start slow. Circle the rim,” Is that what he’s doing now? “And make it nice and loose before going in. Work your way up to two, three, four fingers.” 

“Can you fit four?” Aziraphale asks. 

“Not at this angle.” Crowley says. “But I like a little stretch.” 

“Oh,” He doesn’t understand how he’ll fit into Crowley. Crowley makes a noise above him, chest panting from exertion and slick with sweat, and his cock jerks. 

He does it again, moving his arm. And again. His cock starts going red. “I could come from this alone,” Crowley breathes. “Come all over you and leave you wanting.” The idea is so hot it hurts. Aziraphale whines, putting a hand on Crowley’s thigh. “I won’t tonight, sunshine.”

Aziraphale knows it’s time when Crowley slips out his fingers, making a lost sound, and uses the oil that dripped on his palm to coat his cock. “You’ll do what I say?” Aziraphale nods. He’d do anything to have Crowley. “Be good for me?” 

Aziraphale can’t look at Crowley while he leaks at the thought. Shuts his eyes hard. He wants to be good, wants to be spoken to in that crooning, affectionate tone. He nods again. 

“Put your hands up on the headboard, then.” Aziraphale finds purchase on the top of the headboard, puts his hands on the wood. “Exactly right.” Crowley says, pleased, and Aziraphale grips the wood so hard it groans. “You’ll keep them there for me, or else I’ll sit still on your thick cock for hours. Until you’re begging to be let come.” 

There is a certain good in knowing what the punishment will be. It allows Aziraphale to weigh the costs and the benefits. The idea of getting his hands on Crowley’s form is appealing, but he knows he wouldn’t be able to take hours of that. Knows he wants to be good for him. 

“You should go slow, if you’re going to slide inside. Give me some time to adjust, to get to know what’s coming.” Crowley lines him up, and he can feel the soft skin on his cock. He’s hard enough that it aches. “But I’m the one putting you in me. So, hold on, sunshine, and take a deep breath.” 

He doesn’t get the chance before Crowley’s bearing down. It feels indescribable, a hot heat and so tight that every second he’s certain his cock will go no farther. Crowley doesn’t prescribe to the same beliefs. It only takes seconds before he can feel the weight of Crowley on his thighs, and Aziraphale is barely breathing, he’s panting, eyes whiting out with the feeling. 

“Now that’s the expression I like to see,” Crowley says, but Aziraphale doesn’t even register it. He shoves his body up, desperate to keep seeking that mindless pleasure, to put all of him into Crowley. Crowley hisses. “Keep yourself there. Right there.” 

And Aziraphale freezes, even though his hamstrings will protest in a few moments, even if it’s got his feet propped up on their soles. He keeps his body as Crowley wants it and his hands where Crowley told him to. “Oh, sunshine. You’re perfect.” 

The praise heats him up, spreads through him like wildfire. He can feel the way he tenses in Crowley, watches Crowley bunch his hands on Aziraphale’s stomach. His entire body is one taut line, but Crowley picks himself up anyway. The slide out is almost as good as the drop down, and Aziraphale keeps a tight fist on his twitching. 

His hands feel like they are going to split the headboard. 

Crowley spreads his palms onto Aziraphale’s stomach, says, “I’m going to come from just fucking you.” And really starts in. 

He punctuates every drop with a sound, driving Aziraphale crazy. He can’t tell where the grunts are coming from, only knows his gasps because Crowley’s teeth are ground together. Crowley’s arms start to shake, and his hair sticks to his forehead. 

Aziraphale doesn’t know how to keep himself from coming. He’s been maddeningly close to the edge since Crowley popped him past the ring of muscle, but he bites his arm, keeps his hands hurting from the wood. It’s almost a physical need to see Crowley through to the other side first. 

Something changes in the angle, and Crowley makes the same grunts that he did when he was fingering himself. Throws his head back like he finally found a rhythm. “Oh, you hit just right.” 

Aziraphale’s mouth fills with blood with how hard he bites his tongue. He doesn’t know how to survive with Crowley moving and talking. The new angle has Crowley’s cock lifting and smacking back onto his stomach with each roll. It makes an obscene sound, is leaving a red imprint on Aziraphale. 

“So good for me, just letting me take what I need.” Aziraphale is going to come from this. “You’d give me anything I’d ask for. You would, and you would love it. Stay in my bed, stay hard all day, wait for me.” 

“Yes.” Aziraphale says, thighs shaking. 

“Let me come over and over again on your cock, until it’s so red and aching that a slight breeze could get you off.” Crowley starts to leak, the precome trailing from his cock to Aziraphale’s stomach. 

“Yes,” And he can picture it. His mind is a wash of colors, and every muscle feels drawn tight. 

“Be good for me, forever.” Crowley tightens around him, and Aziraphale thinks that this is it. “Stay with me, forever. In my bed. In me.” 

“Yes, yes, oh, Lord, yes.” Aziraphale comes, tears leaking down the side of his face. In this moment, he thinks it sounds wonderous. Can picture himself inside Crowley until his life finally snuffs out. He’s delirious with want, with the high of it. 

Crowley keeps riding him through his aftershocks, keeps riding him until it starts to burn. Crowley’s still hard. He works himself over Aziraphale, refusing to lift his hands from Aziraphale’s stomach. It hurts and Aziraphale tries to shy away from it. 

“Don’t you want to be good for me?” Crowley whispers. “Just be good, just for a little while longer.” 

And it rakes down his body like nails, from scalp to toe. He does want that. With a fervor that overrides his physical pain. Aziraphale forces his body back where Crowley like it, even as it protests. Sharp sounds rise from his throat, wounded like an animal. They seem to drive Crowley even further up in pleasure. 

“You look so pretty when you cry.” Crowley says. Aziraphale whines, hurt and soft. Crowley pets his cheek and he loves it, loves this. He begins to just grind. “Want to keep you in me. Say you’ll let me.” 

“I’ll let you.” His voice is wet, and his words are cut off with an almost shriek. Crowley’s cock jerks. 

“No matter how bad it hurts. Tell me, promise me, sunshine.” Crowley is shoving his cock across the mess that’s on Aziraphale’s stomach. 

“Promise. Whatever you want.” And he means it, in this moment. His mind is a tangle of fading pleasure and mounting pain and compliments laid down on him in the sweetest voice he’s ever heard from Crowley. 

“Yes, whatever I want.” And he comes, shudders through it. 

Aziraphale releases the headboard careful. His bones creak with the fading tension, but he doesn’t reach out to Crowley. After a few moments of panting breath, quivering, tight stomach, Crowley grabs one of his hands. “So good for me. So good, you deserve a treat.” Aziraphale’s cock responds to that, a moan on the back of Crowley’s throat. He kisses Aziraphale’s palm. 

“I’ll give you something really nice. Sunshine, you were so good for your first time. Like you were made for me.” His face is in Aziraphale’s palm, lips pressed to his flesh and eyes closed. Aziraphale shudders. He wants to have been made for this purpose, feels like he was. 

Crowley slips from Aziraphale. It’s a heady sense of relief, one that has Aziraphale sighing. The outside air feels cool, feels like it’s washing over him and healing him. Wetness drips from inside Crowley onto Aziraphale. “One day, I’ll make you clean up the mess you make inside me. You’ll eat it all out of me and thank me for the privilege.” 

Aziraphale imagines it, vividly. 

“But not tonight.” Crowley sighs, sprawling across the expanse that is Aziraphale. “Tonight, you were too perfect. Already so. Don’t need anything else.” 

“Nothing?” Aziraphale asks, wants to make sure he’s left Crowley more than satiated. Wants to please him to excess. Crowley could glut himself on Aziraphale, and it would more than satisfy the deep needs that burn him from the inside out. 

Crowley cracks an eye, smiles. “You could do one thing.” And he moves Aziraphale’s hand, until it’s at his hole. He helps Aziraphale slip two fingers into the loose, wet hole. “Keep me plugged full of you.” 

Aziraphale stays awake, fingers in Crowley, for a long time after Crowley falls asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next update will be the 28th. 
> 
> Obviously they're not all going to be as filthy as this one, because I've got to move the plot somehow, but it's still E the whole way through.


	3. Chapter Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys I like to leave my notes at the end usually, but just wanted to forewarn that this is the chapter with the scene gone wrong. If you don't feel comfortable reading it, skip the first part and go to the place where the first break in the chapter occurs. The little "--". 
> 
> Next chapter will be out next Tuesday.

The other shipmates begin to talk to him, really speak to him. They talk on old travels, talk on past lovers and whores, the new war. It’s refreshing. Aziraphale is starting to believe he doesn’t really need anyone’s company besides Crowley, but it’s still nice. He’s never felt welcome in his father’s home. 

Like most things on a ship are wont to do, it begins with the first mate. With Beelzebub. He’s headed across the deck, mindful of Crowley’s eyes on him from the wheel. They’re as present on him as his hands, as his mouth. 

Beelzebub is leaning on the rail, rebraiding a rope, and looks up as he passes. The burn mark is still red, and he wonders if it is fully healed. If it stays that red due to the sun or what happened. It feels wrong to inquire. 

“’Lo, Z.” Their voice is flat. 

“Hello, Beelzebub.” Aziraphale says. His hands twitch, and he’s unsure how to place his arms. “How are you today?” 

“Fine.” Beelzebub does not ask him how he is. It would be rude in proper society, but this is a pirate ship. Aziraphale keeps reminding himself that. “Listen, Dagon’s name day is coming up.”

“Oh! I’ll have to make something sweet for her, then.” He has molasses, something that keeps well in a barrel. Perhaps he’d use it and some flour to make an approximation of a cake. He could use some of his cured pumpkin to make a better pie, he thinks. 

“Thanks. She’ll like that.” Beelzebub tightens the rope. “She keeps saying I forget, but what am I supposed to get her when we’re on this ship all the damned time?” 

“You can say the pie is from you.” Aziraphale offers. He has no need to get Dagon a name day present. “Are you…” He trails off, unsure if he should ask personal questions. Beelzebub keeps a pistol on their holster and three knives on their person. Any of them would hurt. 

“Yeah.” Beelzebub says. “It’s why to be pirates—the law of the sea doesn’t give a fuck who you fuck, ain’t going to lock you up for it.” 

“I suppose you’re right about that.” He looks up to Crowley, finds him watching them with a cool expression. His eyes look more jaundice than honey right now and Aziraphale shivers. “I’ve best be off.” 

Beelzebub looks up to Crowley as well, sees the affect he has on Aziraphale. “Okay, Z.” Their voice is still flat, eyes still listless, but they track him as he goes down. 

He forgets about the disengaged gaze while he works on his food. He’s been doing slow cooks, full of salt and honey ham and onions. Once the ham is gone, he’ll use the bone as well to make stock. 

While it slow cooks, he works through his storage. It is hard work, begins to toughen up the fat on his arms and thighs as he pushes crates and barrels across the way to their correct spots. He puts the meats next to each other, hangs the cured squashes and pumpkins over the hard, dried fruits. The barrels are labelled with a thin quill, barely legible, with the beans and vegetables. They’re stacked amongst each other, on their sides, so that he might open and pour into a pot some of their keep. 

He finishes each day covered in salt-sweat, hair stuck to his forehead. Sometimes, he’ll use some of the strained saltwater to clean off himself. It leaves his skin tight and dry, but his clothes aren’t stuck to him anymore. If anyone came down under, while he lets the water drip naked off his form and soak into the wood below, he isn’t sure what he’d tell them. 

Aziraphale carries the roast to Crowley and his room. After the first night, Crowley kept claiming that he’d forgotten to clean out one of the smaller bunks from various baubles that they’d yet to find a seller for. Aziraphale stopped asking for it once they set off from the port town. 

Usually, he’d knock, and Crowley would open the door. It swings open to the nudge from his elbow. Crowley has his back to him, looking at the map. 

He uses his back to click the lock into place. Crowley looks at him, examines him from over his shoulder. “What were you and Beelzebub talking on, today?” 

“They wanted me to make something sweet for Dagon’s name day. Apparently, they’re together.” 

“I didn’t know that.” Crowley says. His voice is too quiet for surprise, eyes still narrowed. “Nothing else?” 

“No, not really.” Aziraphale remembers their conversation. “They said something that made me think they’re a pirate so the Old Religion doesn’t toss them into the brink for sleeping with Dagon.” 

“Is that what they said?” The bowls are hot in Aziraphale’s hands, but his instincts tell him to keep this distance between them. It’s that same scream, there be predators lurking, that he had back in the shop. Sets his hair on his nape up. 

“They said, the sea doesn’t care who you sleep with.” It was something to that affect. He hadn’t paid too much attention, had half his mind on Crowley at the time. He’s always got half of his mind on Crowley. 

“Put the bowls on the table, Aziraphale.” His name, after not being invoked for almost a month, raises alarms in his mind. His shoulders tighten. The door seems a safer option than the table. Still, he wants to do as Crowley wants of him, so he inches around him and sits them down. “Get on the bed.” 

“But what about—” 

“The fucking bed, Aziraphale.” His voice is steel. It’s as sharp as the swords that hang dusty and disused in the halls of his father’s manor. He hasn’t heard this tone from Crowley before. It makes him nervous, in a way that is distinctly uncomfortable. It’s nothing like the tempting, crooning, sweet tones that he usually prefers. 

He sits on the edge of the bed. Aziraphale sees Crowley’s mouth tick down. He’s messed up. “Do I have to tell you to do everything? Of course, take your fucking clothes off.” 

Aziraphale does, cock limp on his thighs. He wonders if Crowley’s going to berate him for that as well. Instead, he walks up and pushes Aziraphale down, puts his hands on the headboard. They’ve done it a few times that were different than this, but Crowley’s got a preference for it. 

He is uncertain on how he’ll perform tonight. Crowley’s eyes are distant still, there is no faint smile gracing his lips. There’s a furrow in his brow and Aziraphale is certain that there is something amiss. He wants to fix it for Crowley, though, keeps his hands on the bed, relaxes his worry. 

It takes some dedicated stroking to get Aziraphale there, Crowley’s hands as warm as his reflection is cool. His cock gets stiff, though, body starts to wake up. Aziraphale is breathing hard by the time Crowley stops. 

Crowley shucks off his pants, climbs on top, and he must have prepared—must have thought about this—because he takes all of Aziraphale in one smooth drop. “I’m going to use you until I come, and then I’m going to take a walk around the deck. Only when I come back will you get to come, and only if you’re still hard.” The way he slams down almost hurts, and Aziraphale winces. “No fucking touching, do you understand me?” 

Aziraphale says nothing, focused on staying hard and willing for Crowley. Crowley takes his face in his hands. “I said, do you understand me?” His fingers dig in like their trying to push through the skin. 

“Yes,” Aziraphale gasps. Crowley leaves raised, red marks as he scrapes down Aziraphale’s face. 

It’s overwhelming, it’s painful. Crowley is quiet during it, not even looking at Aziraphale. He likes to be used by Crowley, but this feels like it doesn’t matter that its him. Crowley is upset at him—Aziraphale realizes suddenly. He has no idea what he’s done, how to be forgiven for something he isn’t aware of. 

His chest feels tight, painfully bad, and when Crowley comes, it is a surprise. There are indicators, always, but so stuck in his own head, he hadn’t noticed. Aziraphale feels the warmth splash over his cooled skin. He shivers with it, teeth clacking. 

Crowley doesn’t say anything before he gets up and leaves. 

He wants, for some reason, Aziraphale to be hard when he gets back. Aziraphale keeps his hands on the headboard and tries to focus on keeping his cock full. The nervous, sick feeling in his chest doesn’t dissipate and he starts to flag. It makes him even worse for wear, worried how Crowley will respond. 

His feet kick at the sheets and he grinds himself down onto them. It’s awful the way that his body betrays him, makes him feel like he’s betraying Crowley. He forces his mind to think on previous encounters, tries to turn away from knowing he did something wrong. 

By the time Crowley comes back, Aziraphale is fully soft and crying. His hands are still on the headboard. 

Crowley is over to his side in seconds, door still open and forgotten. “Hey, sunshine, I’m sorry. It’s okay, I’m here.” He covers Aziraphale with his body. The warmth makes Aziraphale convulse. 

“I don’t like that,” Aziraphale hiccups. “Don’t know what I did wrong, don’t know how to fix it.” 

“You did nothing wrong, sunshine. That was on me.” Crowley pets his face, wipes away his tears. “It’s my fault. Let me get you some water.” 

“Don’t leave me again.” Aziraphale says, voice pitched. “Please, Crowley.” 

“I’m not, it’s right on the table. I’m right here.” He moves and Aziraphale misses the warmth immediately. The door shuts and before he has a chance to rouse panic, Crowley’s back with a glass. He feeds the water into Aziraphale’s pliant mouth so sweetly. He’s already feeling foolish for his flight of fear. 

“I won’t do it again, sunshine. I promise.” He thumbs some water off the skin next to Aziraphale’s mouth. “Sometimes, my mind just tells me things that I can’t help but listen to. I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.” 

“What was wrong?” Aziraphale struggles to find his voice. 

“I was afraid that Beelzebub was going to steal you away from me.” It makes no sense to him. Crowley had guessed correctly their first night—Beelzebub was too dirty and uncaring of their person for him to be interested. He’d rather have Crowley for a night than Beelzebub ever. 

“But they’re with Dagon.” 

Crowley smiles. It’s a soft one, one that says he cares for Aziraphale. One that Aziraphale will hoard in memories. “That doesn’t stop everyone, I’m afraid.” 

“I don’t want Beelzebub.” Aziraphale says. 

“I know.” 

“I want you.” And he means it. He’s feeling shaky, off-footed but can’t imagine separating from Crowley right now. 

Crowley sits the water down on the dresser. “You do, don’t you?” He asks, cupping Aziraphale’s face in his hands. It makes him feel safe. Makes him feel warm and wanted and protected.

“I want you.” Aziraphale repeats.

“Sometimes it frightens me how much I want you. How hungry you make me.” Crowley whispers. His lips are close, he is so close. Aziraphale feels himself open up towards Crowley. “I can’t imagine ever letting you go.” 

\--

Aziraphale avoids the other shipmates the next day and firmly tells himself it isn’t because of the approving looks that he thinks Crowley is tossing to him. 

\--

They’re having dinner, a squash soup and sea biscuits, and Crowley clears his throat. He’s been quiet for most of the night, but not like he was when he was upset. Aziraphale would reckon he’s been thinking. He clicks his teeth, nervous habit, before speaking.

“I don’t feel like I’ve fully apologized for what I did last night.” Crowley says. “It was inexcusable.” 

“I’ve already forgiven you.” The rest of the night, Crowley had a hunted look on his face and had been half-present. Aziraphale reckons he spent the night staring down at him, heedful of every movement that he made in his sleep. The ghost of that expression flares back up. 

“Then why did you not stop to say hello to anyone today?” 

“I thought that you didn’t want me too.” Aziraphale frowns.

“Sunshine.” Crowley sits his glass down. It’s got whiskey in it tonight, not one of Aziraphale’s favorites. He drinks it though, as fresh water is always in short supply. “It shouldn’t matter what I want, when it comes to making friends. Me getting upset is something that I’ve got to work on.”

“You just got so mad.” Aziraphale whispers. He looks down to his soup, reevaluates the way Crowley looked at him today. 

“Not your fault. I want you to be happy here.” 

The room lapses into silence for a time, and Aziraphale struggles to work out what he wants to say. Whenever he took time like this at home, his brothers or father would tell him to be out with it already. He’d stumble over something he decidedly did not want to say and be punished for it. 

Crowley’s quiet. It’s nice. 

“I thought they were a bunch of backstabbers?” Aziraphale smiles weakly. 

The relief in Crowley is clear, the way his shoulders slump and his mouth relaxes. “Oh, they are. Doesn’t mean some of them are fun to be around—you should see Hastur with three ales in him. Very amusing.” 

“How will I know which ones are safe?” 

“First, none of them are safe. Second, don’t worry about that. I’ll keep you sorted, seeing as I kind of owe it to you. Putting you on this ship and all.” Crowley smiles. “Speaking of things I owe you…” 

“Yes?” Aziraphale knows that tone, it’s the one he uses when he’s convincing Aziraphale to come to bed. A small shiver goes through him. Enough to remind him of what he loves, but not enough to make him stupid with it.

“I think I owe you something for being so good to me last week.” Crowley says, sliding out of his seat. “Something special.” He stalks around, all limbs, to where Aziraphale sits. There is a slight want to be straddled, a large want to be held down and used, and an even larger want for Crowley to keep using that soft, special voice on him. 

“Oh, I can’t think of anything I could want.” Aziraphale is pulled from the table. 

“You don’t have to think up anything. That, I can do.” Crowley kisses his wrist, laves attention on his palm. “You just have to tell me if you like it. You can do that, right, sunshine?” 

“I like everything you do.” Aziraphale breathes out. His arm is twitching from the way that Crowley is pressing his mouth on him. It travels hard and hot up through his entire body, lights him up. 

Crowley frowns, pulls back. “I’m serious, Aziraphale. You’ll tell me from now on if you like something or not. If you don’t just tell me to stop. I will, even if I’m cross at you. Even if you’re cross at me.” 

“Okay.” The loss of sensation lets his brain re-center, like a needle on a compass. Last night has clearly affected Crowley down to his roots. “I can do that.” 

“Of course you can. You’ve always done so good by me; this would be no different.” And Crowley is kissing him all gentle. It’s on his neck and cheeks, eyelids and shoulders. He moves Aziraphale out of his clothes. 

It’s warm with affection. Every gesture Crowley makes. “So sweet.” A kiss, and Aziraphale’s shirt is on the floor. “So kind and handsome.” He’s holding onto Crowley’s shoulders. Crowley kneels before him, takes off his pants and kisses his knee. “So good for me.” 

The words do as much as the touches to get Aziraphale ready. He’s a shivering mess, head full of each praise that Crowley gives to him. His body is made of gooseflesh and nerves. All raised towards Crowley. 

“I’m going to suck your cock until you come, sunshine. Then, I’ll fold you into bed and we can go to sleep. Does that sound okay?” 

“What about you?” Aziraphale asks. 

Crowley shakes his head. “This is special, for you. Most of the things we do are for me. It’s okay to be a little selfish sometimes, especially when you earned it. When you’ve been so good as to earn a treat.” 

“Oh,” Aziraphale likes knowing he’s been so good that he’s being rewarded. It causes flashes of heat behind his eyes. 

“Does it sound okay, sunshine? Would you like it?” 

“Yes.” And so, Crowley does what he says. A man of his word. 

\--

He’s cutting off slices off cheese from one of the barrel clumps, having let time slip away from him and deciding on sandwiches, when Ligur shows up in his galley. 

“Oh, I was expecting Jinn. I haven’t quite finished dinner, yet.” Aziraphale says. Ligur disquiets him. He’s got open boils on his face, and his gums are black. Aziraphale bought plenty of dried fruit, citrus for fear of scurvy and yet, Ligur doesn’t seem to get better. 

“Not here for dinner.” Ligur says. 

“What are you here for?” Aziraphale slows down his movements. 

“You like being captain’s kept thing?” He gets the distinct feeling that the answer he should respond with is no. “Keeps you close. You’d be able to do things others can’t.” 

“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re suggesting.” Aziraphale’s voice is sharp. He wouldn’t be able to fight his way out of this, but he’s betting that Ligur isn’t much of a thinker. That he might be able to fool his way, or even bargain his way. 

Ligur presses close to his counter island, leans over it. It looks like a pale imitation of what Crowley did the first time they spoke. Meant to entice. He’s got a boil that looks like it’s going to pop soon. “I think you know exactly what I’m saying.” 

A hand shoots out and Aziraphale knows he’s caught. Ligur’s got him in his grasp, got a serrated knife out, and the waves are crashing outside. No one would hear a thing.

“What would you like me to do?” Aziraphale asks carefully. He’s only thinking on getting out of the galley alive. 

“He keeps a flintlock in the room. Find it. Use it.” 

“And you’ll take me to the mainland?” 

“’Course, Z.” Ligur is a bad liar. “You’ll do it?” 

“I’ll do my best.” Aziraphale doesn’t know if he’s better at lying, or if Ligur is just worse at picking up on it. 

Ligur smiles, lets go of his wrist. Aziraphale moves it away slowly. “Thanks, Z. You’re helping out quite a lot.” 

When he leaves, Aziraphale moves on instinct. He keeps cutting up his cheese, puts the meat and cheese and radish on the sea biscuits. He realizes he’s shaking, takes a few deep breaths. Plates them. Jinn comes down later, smiles way too wide and touches his shoulder. Leans close. 

If he didn’t know Crowley, Aziraphale might have been tempted. Jinn, despite his random bruises and scrapes, is a fine-looking man. He’s got the fullest eyelashes and round lips. But nothing in him strikes close to the way that Crowley heats him. 

He gets across the deck without anyone saying anything. Aziraphale can feel the eyes on him and struggles not to let his knees buckle. Crowley opens up the door to him, a faint smile tugging on his face. It disappears when he gets a good look at Aziraphale. 

The door swings close and Crowley says, “What’s the matter, sunshine?” He takes the plates, first time he’s ever done it. 

“Ligur, I think, asked me to shoot you.” Aziraphale’s been running over how to say it in his mind, idly. It still feels like it’s come out wrong. 

Crowley sets the plates down. “Thanks for telling me. I’ll handle it tomorrow.” His voice is calm, his hands are calm, there is no fear in his posture. Aziraphale does not understand.

“You could be dead tomorrow.” Aziraphale says, his chest closing in. 

“I’ve dealt with these things before. I’ll sort it out tomorrow morning and you can have the morning off. No one will die from a missed breakfast.” 

“You don’t want me to see it.” 

“Sunshine,” Crowley says. “You don’t want you to see it.” 

Aziraphale agrees, and the meal is quiet. They cling to each other throughout the night. 

He wakes up late, Crowley’s side of the bed cool. It’s disorienting for a moment, and then he hears a gunshot. He realizes that that must be what woke him. 

He lays in bed and counts out a hundred seconds before breathing. There’s not another gunshot. There’s the sound of wood scraping, sound of people calling out. Boots stomp down the stairs. Aziraphale thinks he’s been in the ship too long. So long that he can distinguish a wood creak from a sea crash. 

Crowley opens up the door. His footfalls are familiar. 

Aziraphale doesn’t get up. Crowley’s got a little blood on his shirt, and he shucks it off at the foot of the bed. “How’re things?” 

“Fine.” Crowley says. “As normal as it ever is on the Hellsbane.” 

“What…what happened?” He isn’t sure he wants to know. 

“Sent Ligur over the edge. Hastur tried to step in.” 

“The gunshots?” 

Crowley nods. Aziraphale lifts his arms up and he gets the message. Crawls into bed with Aziraphale, lays on his body. They both sigh. “When we get to the southern islands, I’ll find some more hands. There is always willing men for coin.”

“Do you think…do you think that the other shipmates will be upset at me?” Aziraphale asks. It’s the most delicate way he can think to ask if they will hurt him. Crowley gone would have cost him his life, but Crowley here may cost him his hand. 

He wonders if the monastery would ask about it. Wonders what he’d say and how they’d respond. Can you become a monk if you were once a pirate? Can you become a pirate if you were ever a lord?

“No one’s going to touch you, if that’s what you’re worried about.” Crowley kisses the soft where his neck meets his underjaw. “Sure, none of them are thrilled that you didn’t blow me to bits, but they’re all pretty happy to still be living.” 

“You couldn’t kill them all.” Aziraphale says, knowing that a ship needed constant maintenance to keep going.

“I could. Hellsbane and I’d suffer for it, but we’d pull into port all the same.” Crowley sits up on him. Looks him dead in the eye. “I’ve done it before—could do it again. Got a bit of a reputation for it.” 

“A reputation?” 

“There are no quarters on this ship for traitors. Even if it means the whole crews got to go, even if it means that I’m working the ship sunup to sunup for a month.” 

Aziraphale couldn’t imagine how run ragged he’d be. “I mean, surely, and this is no discredit to your skills, but wouldn’t one of them be able to shoot you down before you killed them all?” 

“I’m a faster shot and a better swordsman, but that’s not what sets me separate. None of them think.” Crowley says, eyes distant. “The last time I’d had a full crew mutiny, locked myself in the galley and it’s storerooms. I’ve got a block of concrete wielded like a door that slides right up there. It slows Hellsbane, but not enough for it to be rendered useless.” 

“Why would you lock yourself in the storerooms?” He’s drawn into the story, scans Crowley’s face. It’s the same jaded, cold look that he’s seen before. This time, it’s not directed at him and Aziraphale can admire how destructive he looks. How sharp. 

“That’s where most of the water is, on a ship.” Crowley shrugs. “Wait some days, hope a storm don’t come, and the crew were all too weak to fight. Those that were still living, anyway.” 

“Why didn’t they pull into the port?” 

“Too far to sea. Didn’t want me to escape via a fish boat. Which would have happened, as I’ve done it before. Hellsbane isn’t my first ship, but I’ve held onto her the longest. Six years,” He says it proudly. Aziraphale’s kept horses and plants longer than that, both things that do not enjoy being under his watch. 

Aziraphale frowns, laying down so that Crowley doesn’t see. He puts his hands through Crowley’s hair. Crowley arches into it. “You don’t seem very popular.” 

“No one who’s got power in the pirate world is.” Crowley says. Then he sighs. “But I guess I’m a little less liked than most. I’ve got a strict way of work—no whores on Hellsbane, as they’re fucking thieves, and I keep a tight fist on the liquor. My crew has to keep a clear head to work. Because that’s what it is. It’s work, day in and day out.” 

“The books I’ve read make it sound a lot more fun than what you’re saying.” 

“The captains that focus on fun usually end up dead.” Crowley moves Aziraphale’s hand back to his neck, moans a little with the pressure Aziraphale puts on his muscles. “Or broke, or their ship taken. They don’t look to the future. You can’t be a pirate forever.” 

“And you’re looking to the future? One where you aren’t a pirate?” Aziraphale couldn’t imagine it. Crowley fits so well on his ship, his very body lined like it was made for the sea. 

“I’m always looking to the future, sunshine.” 

\--

The crew doesn’t look at him as he walks across the deck. Aziraphale refuses to let his eyes linger on the red spot, so dark against the grain, that Lilith is mopping away with rags and a bucket of saltwater. He knows then that Crowley is right—he didn’t want to see the punishment doled out. He doesn’t even want to see the aftermath. 

He makes an easy dinner, boiled dough and salted meat to make a dumpling stew. It isn’t healthy, but it is filling. Dagon’s name day is the next day. Aziraphale puts his cured pumpkin in some cold water to let it soften overnight.

Aziraphale isn’t sure that the gift will still be welcomed, or if it will be seen as an apology, or just seen as him keeping his word. He plans to make it anyway. 

Jinn doesn’t say anything to him when he comes to collect the food. 

They’ve got three more weeks at sea, before heading inland. The tension that hangs heavy in the air threatens to choke Aziraphale and he has no idea how to survive another three weeks. 

He says as much to Crowley over dinner. Crowley shakes his head. “It’ll be fine, sunshine. The work will quiet the tension. There’s so much that you’re too tired to keep up anger, you’ll see.” 

Aziraphale begins to unbutton his clothes, ready for their tryst to get him tired, when Crowley starts putting on his shoes. “What are you doing?” 

“I’ve got to take up some of the work that’s open because of Hastur and Ligur. Cause if I don’t, they’ll think I’m punishing them for a crime that they didn’t commit.” 

Aziraphale snorts, a messy inelegant sound. A month ago, it would have never passed his mouth. “I rather think they were all in on it.” 

Crowley smiles. It’s a tired one, one that he gives when Aziraphale’s scope of the world is so much smaller than his. “A crime that I can’t prove that they committed then, sunshine. No need to split hairs over it. If they didn’t get tossed into the drink, then I can’t prove that they deserve it.” 

“Will you be out long?” Aziraphale asks. 

“Be back before the sun slips the sky.” Crowley says. Aziraphale had made an early dinner, nervousness at the atmosphere forcing him to work quicker. He also chose an easier dish to be out of the galley as quick as possible. “It’s a good rule to keep when people want you dead. Don’t be out at night, when the dark can hide them.” 

He kisses Aziraphale before he goes. It’s a deep filthy thing, but Aziraphale keeps his hands off himself when he’s alone. Knows that Crowley will want him when he returns. 

Aziraphale strips off his clothes, settles himself onto the bed. He tosses up the idea of sleeping—something he’s done in excess today—or rifling around and finding something to read. Crowley won’t have any book without purpose, but some informative literature may be good as well. While he dawdles on deciding, the bed grows softer and warmer beneath him and Aziraphale slips his eyes close. For a moment. 

He comes to with Crowley naked atop him, hard cock rubbing against his soft one. Aziraphale’s body works overtime to make them equal. They both rut for a moment, lost to the sensation. 

“Do you like what we do?” Crowley asks, eyes half-mast in pleasure. 

“Think that’s quite the point.” Aziraphale says. He doesn’t understand the question, thinks his body is an answer in and of itself. 

“Not this, sunshine. I know you like this.” Crowley slows and Aziraphale bites his own lip at the loss. “When I…when I keep going after you’re satisfied. Y’like that?” 

“You like that.” Aziraphale touches his thigh, trails up to the jut of his hipbone. “You like it so much, it makes me like it.” 

“Yeah, but is it good to you?” He doesn’t ask if it makes Aziraphale feel good, because he couldn’t answer that in the affirmative. It burns and overwhelms in the worst way. It brings tears out of Aziraphale. 

If Crowley were to ask if it made him replete, he’d say yes. If he’d ask did it make Aziraphale feel cleansed, he’d say yes.

“I love it when you use me.” Aziraphale says honestly. “Anyway you want. Anyway you’d have me.”

“Careful, sunshine.” Crowley shudders on top of him. “I could take you up on that.” 

“I’d let you.” 

And his bed talk must be getting better, for Crowley jerks once more and bites out, “Enough. I need you. Want you to fuck me today.” He moves under Aziraphale, props himself up to present. 

It’s rare that Aziraphale lays his weight on Crowley, who always enjoys having the ability to control the pace and strength. It doesn’t mean that he’s not going to listen to every instruction that comes hissed from Crowley’s mouth. 

Aziraphale has learned a lot about bedding since meeting Crowley. He’s learnt to stretch slowly and where, when he’s inside, to aim. Where to hit that makes Crowley’s left knee go out and a guttural sound come from deep inside his chest. 

“Harder, sunshine.” Crowley says. He puts his hands on the headboard, lays them flat so that Aziraphale won’t shove him up the bed during this. 

Going harder is better for both of them. Aziraphale can feel al of Crowley with all of himself. The speed and strength make it feel as if he is never without Crowley. It builds pleasure quicker, makes his heart pound. “You aren’t going grab and pull me,” Crowley tightens his hands on the bedpost. “You’ve got to do it yourself.” 

Aziraphale lays his hands flat on Crowley’s tattoo. He doesn’t have leverage here. 

“You were made to be mine.” Crowley praises. It pushes Aziraphale closer, makes him moan into the sticky, sweat air around them. “Look at how well you fit into me. Look at how well I take you. How well you follow me.” 

“I’d follow you to the ends of the earth.” Aziraphale swears, coming.

Crowley can feel it, his spend too hot to not be felt. “Keep going, please keep going.” 

He rides the pleasure for all that it’s worth and understands Crowley’s earlier demand. He keeps his hands flat on the tattoo. Crowley wants him to do this himself, instead of having it done to him. Aziraphale knows the moment his body starts to protest. When it takes a turn to pain. 

Each thrust is met with a hiss and he’s slowing, he knows it. Crowley says, “Faster, sunshine. Fuck me like you want me to come more than anything.” 

And he does, truly. Aziraphale picks up his pace, focuses on the sounds that punch out of Crowley. It’s agony, torture, it’s so sweet that Aziraphale isn’t sure he can live without it. 

A sob bubbles out of him. His cheeks are wet and there’s blood from where he’s been biting his lip. Another ugly sound rises up, pleasure-pain and loud. Aziraphale feels disconnected from it. He’s only focused on Crowley, entire mind narrowed down to the demand before him. 

“Fuck, yes.” Crowley says, and comes. Aziraphale is lagging, but not soft yet, and the way Crowley clenches around him hurts. It’s so bad that it lays heavy on his tongue. 

He keeps moving through it. 

Crowley slips him out after a moment, lays down on his spend. Aziraphale keeps himself up. He lets Crowley gather his breath for what comes next. While he waits, he finally realizes why Crowley asked the earlier question. With the way that they always finish with Aziraphale crying, it could look like the bad night. 

But if Crowley knew that Aziraphale wanted this, then the tears are different. His limp cock and harsh breaths are from enjoyment, rather than wretched panic or fear. 

Aziraphale brings Crowley up on his knees, spreads him open. Some seed had slipped out in the down time, and he laps it up. Crowley buries a hand in his hair, will pull if he goes too rough, as Aziraphale begins to eat him out. 

Crowley sighs, relaxes against him. Oil and come coat Aziraphale’s lips, his tongue. He’s a mess of fluids, kneeling between Crowley’s legs, and he’s so bloody thankful for it. It fills him, swells every time he swallows, with every taste he gets of them together. He’s got the sudden urge to tell Crowley how much he appreciates this, him. It settles over him easy and warm. 

In a world of places that he could be, Aziraphale would find no better altar than this to lay himself down on.


	4. Chapter Four

The southern islands are hot. It’s almost as if winter never shows it’s face here, the sun never moving away from her position in the sky. Aziraphale has only been on the islands a handful of times, a holiday with his mother or an invite from some lord or another. It’s warm enough all year that they continuously make the mainland’s chocolate, a favored treat. Some of their other main exports are coffee, sugar cane, and various jewels. 

Jewels, Crowley tells him, is what they are here for. As the southern islands are in open war with the mainland, they take or give no gold. It is a king’s piece. Instead, things are traded or given. The information will give them jewels, the jewels will be sold for gold. 

They bring out a few of their own trinkets—some knives, scarves, some fish they’ve caught on the high sea. Aziraphale does not have anything to offer besides his fine clothes and he is loathe to see those go. Perhaps he could convince Crowley a trade between them would be fair order, if he spotted anything that held his eye. 

The sands here are shiftier than on the western isles. A pure white in comparison to the dull brown that makes up the isles. Even the sea here shines brighter, a true blue instead of a grey. Aziraphale can feel the soles of his shoes burn on the sand. 

The town is on the beach, the whole of the island is nothing but beach it seems, a small one meant to do trade. It’s got some wooden walkways that can be seen under the slight covering of sand that has been kicked up on it. Aziraphale knows that his skin will be pink by the end of the day, if he is made to stay out here for too long. 

The galley has protected him from the sharp sun of the sea. Whether that was by design or accident, it has helped him. Crowley loved his freckles for the short time his skin had been sun-kissed. 

Crowley moves him along walkways, past the baubles that men in loose pants and no shirts try to upsell to them. He told him when they pulled into harbor that there was a bar he wanted to take Aziraphale to. It feels like courting, like romance. Makes Aziraphale want to wear something fine and follow all the etiquette. Crowley wouldn’t know how to follow it, would make a mockery of it, but Aziraphale knows he’d love that as well.

The bar is one of the few structures that doesn’t seem to be a put-up tent on the island. There are some women in gauzy material laying on the rails of the porch, look at them as they pass by. They’ve got the good sense not to try and solicit Crowley and Aziraphale. 

Inside is cool, or cool by modicum when compared to outside. There are young men manning most of the bar, bringing out drinks and food from the kitchens. It seems that all of them are too young to go to war, but too old to not bring home something to their family. Aziraphale expected at least one or two men back from the war, through disfigurement or cowardice. Someone he could look at and say, same as I. 

When Crowley finds them a table, a man approaches them. He’s all tan, strong muscle. His pants hang loose on him and he’s got a fool’s gold band on his arm. Aziraphale can tell, the way it shines is too sharp and some of it is peeling away. The smiles, teeth a stark white on his face, at Crowley.

Aziraphale instantly dislikes him. 

“Hello,” The man says. His voice is higher than either of theirs. Perhaps it will continue to deepen with age. “We’ve got fried cod today, if it’d please you sirs or salmon on the pan. You’ll find no better ale selection in all of the southern islands.” 

“Is that so?” And Crowley is smiling at him. The look on his face strikes somewhere adjacent to Aziraphale’s solar plexus. He feels sick from it. “Is that all I’ll find that is better than the rest of the islands?” 

They lean closer, like Aziraphale isn’t even there. And suddenly, he’s not. He cannot find the words to speak up. He is being choked by a dark, ugly thing inside his throat. It coats the inside of his mouth. All he can think is that this man has enough cushion on him to be of value to Crowley, without the extra. Is strong. Is so handsome it aches somewhere deep. 

“You can find anything you look for here, if you know where to look.” The man says. He puts his hands on the table. Aziraphale wishes he carried a knife, so that he could take a finger. “If you’ve the right price to give.”

“I’ve no short supply of gold or gifts. Let that be known.” Crowley sits back from him, looks at Aziraphale. His smile fades some. “I’ll have some ale from the cask, but some barley wine for my friend here.” The man leaves their table, finally, and Aziraphale feels Crowley’s foot find his under the table. His hand covers Aziraphale’s. 

He wants to jerk out of the hold. He wants to keep it forever. 

“Don’t be fooled by the name, sunshine. Barley wine is still ale, but it’s got a taste that I’ll think you’ll love. Like a pear. Or maybe they make it darker on the islands. So it’ll taste like chocolate. Either way, both things you like, right?” 

“Right.” Aziraphale manages to speak. His voice is clipped. 

Crowley frowns.

He won’t push the issue in public, that Aziraphale knows on him. Crowley would prefer to keep up the untouchable image. “Would you like the cod or the salmon? We get plenty of cod on the boat, so I’ll go for salmon, personally.” 

“I think I’ll just take the drink.” Aziraphale says. “Had a large breakfast.” It’s a lie, bold and easy to call out. He ate little this morning in preparation for this outing with Crowley. If he only gets the drink, then he could leave before Crowley and that man continue to dance around each other. 

“If you’re sure.” Crowley says, looks to the kitchens. Aziraphale reads that he’s looking for his next meal, metaphorically. “We can come back another day.” They’ve set up for five days on land. Enough time to negotiate the price of what Crowley knows. 

“Maybe.” Aziraphale pulls his hands away and into his lap. The air feels much cooler on his hand than before. 

Another man brings them their drinks and they sip them in silence. Crowley watches the bar, casts eyes to Aziraphale when he thinks he’s not watching, and grimaces over the sharp taste of his drink. Aziraphale loves his. He usually does when Crowley tells him that he’s going to. 

Crowley offers to take him back to the ship, to see him returned, but Aziraphale waves him off. Says that he’s got to start on dinner for tonight. He actually made it the night before, wanting to spend today with Crowley. 

He makes a small side dish, some rice that is boiled and ready too quick for his liking. It’ll go well with the bean soup. 

After he finishes the rice, as it is high noon, he takes to the captain’s quarters. Crowley never gave him his own bunk. Being surrounded by the reminders of Crowley exacerbates the evil thing in his chest, provokes it. He won’t smash anything, but his hands itch to do so. 

Is this what Crowley felt when he saw Aziraphale talking to Beelzebub? How did he deal with it, how does he stow it away?

Hours pass and Aziraphale moves from wretched sickness to anger. He’s certain that the man in the bar would not satisfy Crowley, why can’t Crowley see that? What’s wrong with him? 

What’s wrong with him? 

It’s a question that prowls around his mind, cutting into his psyche with anger and doubt. He’s worked himself over by the time the door swings open and Crowley comes in. Aziraphale is sitting on the bed at that point, as he had tired of pacing along the wooden floor. The door closes. Crowley makes no move to come further into the room. 

“I’ve found a bookseller, sunshine. We could go tomorrow, get you something besides my things to read.” He attempts to deflect at the tension in the air. 

“Maybe.” Aziraphale agrees. He wants to fling hurtful words, crazed ones that have bearing only in his mind and one conversation between Crowley and a bar man. “If there’s time.” 

“Of course there’s time. I made sure to give you a light load so we could have time to do things together.” He isn’t just speaking on doing things on the islands. Aziraphale had a favorable workload since the first day he woke up tied to a post. 

“Okay.” His voice is small, and he doesn’t sound properly thrilled. 

Crowley’s boots hit heavy on the floor as he walks towards Aziraphale. “What’s the matter, sunshine?” 

And Aziraphale starts to cry, the tight feeling in his chest refusing him to speak, refusing to release him. Crowley knows the hitch of his shoulders, the sound of his breath, when he’s sobbing, intimately. He’s got Aziraphale’s face in his hands. He wipes away at the tears. 

“Who was the man at the bar?” Aziraphale asks. “Do you want him?” 

Crowley blinks like this is the first time he’d heard about a man at a bar or the idea that he could want him. “Why would I ever want him?” 

“You certainly acted like it.” He sniffles some, the tears stinging at his eyes. It’s somewhat fucked that he’s getting hard from this—the one time Aziraphale will think that word, because it’s the most apt descriptor. He’s getting hard from crying. Like his body recognizes that it is something that is so tied up into sex. “You never act like that with me.” 

“I don’t have to act with you. I let you see me; let you see exactly what I am—when I’m wanting or lacking.” Crowley thumbs at his cheek. Aziraphale wonders if these tears turn him on. “I’ve got to speak in code when I go into that bar, if I’m looking for men. It’s against the law to ask for new pirates, outright.” 

“Oh,” Aziraphale knew they’d be looking for new shipmates. Hellsbane runs, but roughly, with their lowered numbers. “So you don’t…even though he looks like that?” 

Crowley barks out a laugh, surprise taking over his features. “I don’t care what he looks like. He’s much too rough for me. I like you soft, like that about you.” 

“Why?” He doesn’t understand it. He’s pleased that Crowley wants him so, but it doesn’t make sense. Even his mother would sometimes shoot a disapproving eye at his frame and she loved him more than the moon. 

“You’re so posh, so pure. My own person to muddy, to have.” He pauses for a moment. “I’ve a taste for the all-consuming and you give it to me, meet me there, every time. I’ve no need for anyone else.” 

Crowley’s face takes on a darker look, eyes lit in their sockets. “If you ever doubt it, I’d show you. Let you fuck me in front of whoever you think I’ve got my eye on—let them see that you’re the only one I want to use.” 

“That’s ridiculous.” Aziraphale says. He stutters over the words a bit, imagines it. Folding himself over Crowley, pointing their bodies in the direction of the table, where the man sits, unable to touch. Letting him watch Aziraphale punch noises from Crowley, pull praises from him. Put his hands in Crowley’s hair to hold his face up. So that that man could see the unbridled pleasure writ across his features. Hold out until Crowley comes, slip from him still hard and tell the man to leave. 

Aziraphale does not say no.

This fact is not lost on Crowley, who grins. “You’d put on quite the show, sunshine. You flush so pretty whenever I tell you how wonderful you are, look so lost when I’ve got your cock in me.” Crowley puts his hands on Aziraphale’s shoulders, moves to straddle him. “It’s not a picture I’m keen to share. But I’d do it so you’d know, without a doubt, I’ll always choose you when it comes down to it. Would rather have you than any other.” 

Aziraphale lays down onto the bed; Crowley works off his shirt. 

\--

The fried cod is delicious. Crowley tells him he should be sick of it with how often they have it on their own menu, but it is Aziraphale’s favorite fish. 

They go on the third day to the bookkeeper’s tent. Crowley prowls around to see if there’s any new scrolls or parchment—or even a book—on Hellsbane or himself. He tells Aziraphale that it is good to keep up with the news of yourself, so that you’ll never be shocked to learn of what you can or have done. 

Aziraphale finds a book of poetry and one on horticulture. He also picks up a filthy romance bit about pirates, just to see what Crowley would say when he saw it. Perhaps also to read it. 

When he gets to the bookkeep, he realizes he’s got to part with something. They’ll take no gold. And it’s not as if he’s paid a portion, being captive and all. He’s feeling somewhat guilty of his outburst the day before, the ludicrousness of it, and doesn’t want to ask Crowley. Not because he’d say no. 

Going to a monastery after his time is done and all, he wonders if he even needs these books. His mind skitters away from the thought, has done so for a while. 

Aziraphale pulls off his pinky ring. It’s been his since his sixteenth, a gift from his father. It matches the ones that Michael and Gabriel wore. Perhaps, one day, it will be traded up to the western isles and his father will think him dead. Or will wonder how it moved from the monastery to the rebellious southern islands. 

The bookkeep takes it, turning it this way and that, and proclaims he should have another book for the price of the gold. Aziraphale knows it is a fine piece of metal. It surprises him how honest the man before him is. 

He looks through the stacks again, no bookshelves here. Nothing strikes his fancy. He sees Crowley carrying a few scrolls and he heads to intercept him. “Let me get these for you.” He says. 

The bookkeep agrees it is fair price. 

“What did you barter away?” Asks Crowley. 

He touches the exposed skin of his pinky, whiter than any of his other flesh. He’s not been without his ring for years. “I gave away something that I would have to anyhow.” Aziraphale says. “You don’t get to keep fine things in the monastery.” 

Crowley frowns. They haven’t discussed him leaving since the first night, and Aziraphale can tell he is also loathe to bring it up. “You could have kept it until you went, at least. Fine things go quite well on a pirate ship, and I would know. I’m the expert.” 

Aziraphale smiles. He doesn’t say anything.

Crowley’s got to talk to one of the generals today, who came in on a frankly massive ship. He believes he’ll get the best trade for his knowledge from someone who wants it for more than academic pursuits. Aziraphale is inclined to agree with him. They brush lips, brief and quick, at the dock of the ship before Crowley strides away. The simple act is a daring one, one that has Aziraphale’s heart set off like it was in a race. Wondering if someone will approach, try something.

If anyone sees them, they think better than to reprimand. 

He’s already made a meal for the night. It’s something rather decadent, a smoked ham that was earned in a trade by Amon. He’ll get the lion’s share of the meat. Aziraphale drizzles some sugar on it, adds some pineapple and some greens on the side. The greens also came from the stalls. It’s the first time he feels like he’s made fresh food in a while. 

The rest of the crew will be here for dinner tonight. Aziraphale tries not to take it as praise for his cooking, instead tells himself firmly that they’ve bartered and bargained away all that they can and have nothing left for the food on the island. 

Crowley isn’t back by the time he brings the food into their room. He sits it on the table, mindful of the small stack of books he’s acquired. While he waits, he thinks to pick up one of the books—doesn’t look at the tawdry romance novel—when the scroll catches his eye. 

It is on top of the rest of the things, careful in pursuit of not being torn. Aziraphale picks it up. If he listened at his dinner table, he may have known something about Hellsbane before setting foot on the ship. But the way his father and brothers spoke on war and capture and bloodshed turned his stomach. 

He wonders what people have to say about Crowley. It seemed somewhat fantastical that Crowley has survived two full ship mutinies, had stowed himself on away on a boat or in a galley. Was that enduring. 

The scroll doesn’t speak on Crowley, at least not until the end. There is a list of crimes committed by those aboard the Hellsbane. Ransacking a merchant ship, stealing a lord’s son. Both things Aziraphale knew. It smarts some that his name is not mentioned on the parchment. Also worries him, as his father must know then. But the list is longer, things that Aziraphale was unaware of. 

Burning of war ships. 

Pillaging a town—in which a prison-full of whores were released. 

Robbing a gaggle of lords on the high seas. 

Preventing the Church from its Holy Duty of burning two witches at the stake. The witches were never found, and were accused of rampant and perverse sexual deviancy, up to and including lesbianism. 

Aziraphale, if he were to have read this six months ago, would think of how improper and dastardly the pirates were. He can’t muster that feeling in him. 

It lists the pirates by name and rewards for each. Hastur and Ligur were both five hundred gold pieces, a handsome sum were they not at the bottom of the drink. Lilith was worth two hundred—as was Jinn. Beelzebub and Dagon, interestingly, were not mentioned. 

Crowley had his price set at two thousand gold pieces. It is a large enough sum that Aziraphale’s hands shake at it, and he closes the scroll quickly. 

If anyone on the ship were to find out about the bounty, there would be no more talk on murdering Crowley. They’d tie him up and take him to the nearest mainland port. No wonder he was so adamant on getting any scrap of his information and holing it away. Aziraphale has the desperate urge to burn every piece of literature in the room. And then the bookkeeps stall, to be safe. 

The food is cold by the time that Crowley returns, and the scroll is safely tucked out of sight. He isn’t attempting to hide that he’s read it from Crowley. He simply does not wish to look on it anymore. It’s almost dark and he’s been jittery watching the oil in the lamp lower.

There is a pouch attached to Crowley’s belt, and it clinks when he walks. It sits fat and distorted on his hip. The trade went well, Aziraphale thinks. “Is the deal settled?” 

Crowley nods. “We’ve still two days here, if we wish. I’ll let us stay, only to wait out and see if any boy will be willing enough to join. I don’t enjoy the evening work.” He takes a bite out of the ham, chews it thoroughly. “Tomorrow, I’ll ask the crew if they’d like their jewels to trade themselves or the gold I make off of it.” 

“I will not bet with you on that.” Aziraphale says. They’d had small bets during his stay, whether Beelzebub would take up Dagon’s next shift or if Jinn would bust his lip or eye again—and which first. This one is based on the collective, something that he does not know well enough. 

“I wasn’t going to make a bet.” Crowley gripes, lying. “Anyway, they’ll take the jewels. None of them trust me enough to not pocket the gold.” 

“Would you?” 

“Sunshine, I am appalled that you would think that.” His mouth is ticked up in a smirk, eyes dancing. “Oh, I’ve got you something, too. Took me longer than the actual deal to get it made. Was down at the forge until sunset for it.” 

Crowley fishes out something small from his pocket. It makes a heavy sound when it hits the table and rolls across to Aziraphale. Crowley keeps the air of someone unaffected but watches carefully to see what he thinks on it. 

It’s a ring. 

Gold, like his last. His last was a small emblem of his family house, with the band etched to look like braided rope. This one has the band made of downward leaves. Atop them sits a piece like a crown, a shield on the raised portion. Etched onto the shield is the same snake that Crowley wears on his back. 

His first ring was to be claimed as one of his house. This one is to be claimed by Crowley. 

“I love it.” Aziraphale says. He barely refrains from saying, I love you. He feels it thrum through him, more desperate and hungrier than any emotion before. There was softness towards Crowley, since the first time he’s had him, but this is different.

This is much more tangible. It rocks his core to the tune of the waves beneath his feet. Gets him worried about what Crowley would think on his affection. 

He slips it on his finger, gets up from the table. Food holds no appeal to him in the moment. “Let me thank you properly.” Aziraphale grabs him by his wrist, plants a kiss on Crowley’s knuckles. If Crowley were a lady, someone he had met in courting, it would be a touch too long to be considered proper. Here, it’s rather chaste. Almost prudish as a precursor. 

“What’ve you got in mind?” Crowley asks, rising easy from the table. He gathers close to Aziraphale’s chest, mindlessly, like an embrace. 

“Anything you want.” Aziraphale kisses his knuckles again, presses open mouth, hot and needy tongue to Crowley’s skin. “Anything. I mean it.” 

“That’s a tall order for you to fill, sunshine.” Crowley goads them toward the bed, and Aziraphale lets himself tip back onto it. Crowley plants his hands at Aziraphale’s head. He straddles Aziraphale’s stomach. “Sure you’re up to the challenge?” 

It’s a bet, plain and simple in Crowley’s eyes. 

“I wouldn’t have said it if I didn’t think I was.” Aziraphale is feeling bold. Crowley grins, tongue darting out, and falls on top of him. He doesn’t even make a sound, Crowley’s weight wholly insignificant. 

“Rub my back.” Crowley says. “You have no idea what the humidity does to me, absolutely destroys me, that is.” 

“It’s humid out on the ocean,” Aziraphale flips him anyway, mindful of any sharp edges that could lay bruises to their skin.

Crowley groans while helping him remove his shirt. He goes boneless after it’s off. “It’s different, though. The wind and water help some—and I’m moving. Today, the man just wanted to stand and talk. Wouldn’t even hear about nice, jaunty walk to get the blood pumping.” 

“Of course,” Aziraphale almost adds, my dear. He wants to. Wants to let affection not only bleed from his voice and actions, but words as well. His mother used to call his father her dear, when they were exceptionally happy, when her eyes were bright and smile large. 

Aziraphale will leave in two months’ time. How can he give away his heart, how can he ask for Crowley’s, and then leave? 

He turns his focus away from it. The oil works well on Crowley’s back, not just as a sex aid. The knots and tough patches on Crowley give way to his capable hands. Moans and grunts rise from beneath him. When Aziraphale gets his fingers on a particularly tense spot, Crowley fists his hands into the sheets and hisses. Aziraphale’s body responds. 

The lamps are all but burned out by the time Aziraphale finishes. Crowley’s loud praises have diminished to murmuring. Snatches of snores rise from his chest to be bitten off by a small moan. 

Aziraphale is wondering if Crowley would mind terribly if they were to engage in a more rigorous activity. This was supposed to be a favor to Crowley, which has him waffling on whether or not he should ask. He doesn’t get the opportunity before Crowley is shuffling around to find a comfortable position, pants stripped off so that Aziraphale could do his legs, and he rises straight into his erect cock. 

There is no help for how Aziraphale gasps and jerks against him. He moves back, shame flushing on his face. 

Crowley picks his head up, not bothering to open his eyes. “if you want, sunshine, but you best move slow enough that I can get some shut eye.” His voice is groggy and some of his hair is stuck to his temple. 

His head collapses back onto the pillow. 

A small snore raises up some moments later. Crowley has always been a light sleeper. He’s a preference of long stretches of sleep, sundown to noon, says they make up for the times he wakes in the night. He rarely gets them though, works the morning up top so that the hotter time of day can be spent stowed away.

Aziraphale coats his fingers in the oil, puts it back into the dresser. He’s heedful of how gentle he must be in this endeavor. Prepping him would rouse Crowley so Aziraphale shifts his thighs apart, rubs the oil over the insides. It reminds him of their first time. 

He tucks his cock careful into the crease, lays down behind Crowley and encases him in his arms. One folds sure along his chest. It gives him leverage to move shallow and safe. Crowley stirs—it is inevitable that he’d wake up. He grumbles some, thighs tightening while his body stretches and then goes languid again. 

Aziraphale peeks his eyes over Crowley’s shoulder. He can see his head come out the other side, can see Crowley’s soft cock nestled above his own. It is a strangely arousing scene. The fact that this is for him, but only in so that he does not disturb Crowley. If he cannot accomplish it inside the rules set by Crowley, Aziraphale will find no pleasure tonight. 

A rotation of hips is easier than a full thrust. It jostles less. Crowley mumbles in his sleep, hand on Aziraphale’s arm squeezing once. He wonders where between the dream realm and reality Crowley is. 

The tight need to finish before Crowley wakes up, fully, and the requirement to do exactly as Crowley told him to do has him worked up quick. Aziraphale struggles not to pant against Crowley’s nape, keeps his mouth shut tight. His lungs scream protests at him. The slight tinge of pain adds to the experience, and he starts purposefully holding his breath in, only letting it out when he must. 

When his legs begin to shake, begin to signal he is close, he forces them to stop. Aziraphale holds all that tension in his stomach, with his breath. He’s choking, whole body a tight rope keeping up a sail, and he’s going to snap—he’s going to snap apart. 

Only knowing that Crowley wants to sleep keeps him contained. Aziraphale comes, mind blank but the sound of the sea, and releases the breath he was holding. Slowly. 

He cleans up the mess he makes on Crowley. It is appealing in both ways to think of Crowley waking up and seeing what he did, and Crowley not knowing if he finished, but he doesn’t wish to cause him any discomfort. So Aziraphale wipes down his thighs and Crowley sighs, content, in his sleep. 

\--

The next day three of the southern islands’ people show up on the ship. Aziraphale is making his way to the galley and sees them on deck. Two are men, both too young to be of fighting age. They dress in their way—shirtless, loose pants and sandals. The sun is even harsher in the sea, and they will want shirts. He hopes Crowley tells them. 

The last is a woman. She’s wearing gauzy film and has a bandage wrapped over her eye. The other one tracks him well enough, so well that Aziraphale can tell that it was not a recent injury. She’s grown used to relying on one eye. 

He doesn’t stop to say hello. The other shipmates have begun to say hello to him again, but the footing is still unsure. He’d hate to have his first impression with them tarnished over something as trivial as a failed mutiny. 

Aziraphale does make something nice for dinner, though. He’d managed some eggs from market and decides to make a fried cod. It is not dissimilar to the one that he ate in the bar, but it was such a good dish. He has no idea if they are able to eat like that from day-to-day. But if they do, then it is a home dish. And if they don’t, it is a delicacy. Either way, Aziraphale thinks they’ll like it. 

He resaves the oil he boils in after it cools down. Not much requires the cooking oil, as most things become soup, but it is expensive. He bakes a medley of potatoes and onion to go on the side. 

One of the new men come down instead of Jinn. Aziraphale has gotten good at reading the lanterns, knows it is time for dinner to be served. He’s got eyes like mahogany, hair curled and falling into his face. He’s got it tied back some, a loose ponytail. 

“Hello,” Aziraphale says. “Is Jinn occupied?” 

“I don’t think so.” The man responds. He smiles, his teeth stark white against his tan skin. He’s got some freckles that decorate his cheeks and the bridge of his nose. When he comes closer, Aziraphale can see how his eyelashes curl absurdly. “I just asked if I could have this job. Get everyone their dinner, get to meet the cook—seemed like a good deal.” 

Aziraphale blushes. He doesn’t know why it would be a job to be traded. “It is an effective way to meet everyone.” He agrees. 

The man laughs. It’s throaty, lower than his voice. Perhaps what he will sound like when he grows into his shoulders. “I’ve decided on my pirate name—Lucifer. What’s your name?” 

“Z.” Aziraphale notes that he doesn’t ask for his pirate name, instead just his name. it’s a clever trick. Or would be—if that is what Lucifer is going for. “That’s an ambitious name. Quite a lot to live up in it.” 

Lucifer shrugs. “I’m sure I’m not the first—or will be the last—to pick that name. Kind of like John, or Michael, you know? But for the high seas.” 

Aziraphale almost says that he has a brother named Michael. He stops himself, frowning. “You’re probably right about that.” Lucifer angles a hip onto his counter island, stretches out like a cat to sun. He’s careful to not knock around the plates that Aziraphale has worked on. 

“What’s this then?” Lucifer asks. 

“Fried cod,” Aziraphale starts. 

Lucifer claps his hands, laughs. “Like the bar, right?” Aziraphale nods, unaccustomed to such energy from anyone on the boat. “Oh, I’ve never went. It’s upscale to bring money into the islands, so none of us can really afford it.” 

“Well, I tried to make it as close to what it tastes like.” 

“I’m sure it’ll be great either way.” And he smiles, lights up, is so kind that Aziraphale can’t help but smile back. “I’ll get these out to the rest of the crew, then?” 

“Of course, go ahead.” Aziraphale picks up his plates. “I usually take dinner for Crowley and I.” 

“Crowley and you?” Lucifer asks. Aziraphale pinks, ducks his head, unaccustomed to the knowing look. His smile turns private, turns small and shy. Lucifer hums and begins to layer the plates on his arm. It’ll take him a few trips. 

Aziraphale walks behind him up to the dock. He nods when they depart and Aziraphale, perhaps foolishly, thinks that he would make a good friend. The feeling carries to Crowley and his quarters. Must show on his face, because halfway through dinner, Crowley asks him about it. 

“What’s put you in such a good mood today, sunshine?” 

“I met one of the new recruits. They’re very kind. It’s refreshing to see a smile, for someone to laugh.” Aziraphale says. 

Crowley frowns. “I laugh.” 

“Of course you do, my dear.” Aziraphale waves off his concern. “But that’s in here. I know you enjoy my company, but I waffle some with the others.” 

This seems to put Crowley at ease. “Just as long as we know that none of them will ‘enjoy your company’ as much as I do.” He takes a sip of brandy. They’ve bought some more wine, plan to drink it as the ship is deep in the sea. There’s been an estimation of a month and a half before they get to the mainland port that’ll trade in the jewels. 

That Aziraphale will be dropped off at. 

“I wouldn’t think of it.” Aziraphale agrees, pops some of the roasted potatoes into his mouth. Chews and swallows. Lucifer was a lovely thing to look at, so bright that it was distracting, but much too young. Crowley’s taught him that he prefers an instructor, prefers someone that knows. 

“I’m excited to get away from here, now that we’ve got some fresh hands.” Crowley says. “I really don’t enjoy the southern climate.” 

“Neither do I. It makes the galley feel like right hell.” Aziraphale was putting less effort into the meals because of it. Tonight was a special occasion, and he feels that he sweated off half a stone. “The mainland is moving close to winter. I wonder if we’ll see snow.” 

“Probably. The port is fairly north, but not as north as Florence’s.” Crowley hesitates for a moment. “When we get there, there’s something I want to show you. Before you decide to head off.” 

“Something on the mainland?” Aziraphale can’t imagine what it would be. 

“Yes… it’s more secret than anything else. Everyone else thinks I visit a whorehouse, so don’t think it’s that. If they tell you anything about this port.” Crowley twitches in his seat some, slides his eyes away from Aziraphale and clicks his tongue. Clicks it again. 

“I’ll go with you to see it, whatever it is.” He promises. “Before I leave.” 

“Don’t go saying that. You could stay another few months, stay another year. They already know you’ve been captured—what’s a little longer? The monastery will still be there come later.” 

Aziraphale sits his fork down. There’s a quiet tide in his body, feels like his breath pulls it forward and back. He knew this argument was coming. “The monastery is where I belong. I can’t keep putting it off.” 

“Why? Why is that where you belong?” Crowley’s face twists up. He’s geared up for a fight, too. 

“It’s where my father has seen fit to—”

“Fuck your father.” Crowley hisses. “He doesn’t care about you, Aziraphale. There has been no word about him even sending someone to find the pirate ship that took you. He only wants to not have to look at you—so why would you care where he wants to send you?” 

The words are honest, cut deep. Aziraphale pulls himself up, can feel his tide sloshing out of him and onto his clothes. Feels unbalanced and unhappy. Forces his voice to remain steady. “I know you don’t know what it’s like to be highborn. It comes with certain expectations.” 

“Expectations.” Crowley mocks, teeth clacking around the word. “Just ‘cause you know what they are doesn’t mean you have to follow them. You’re on a bloody pirate ship.” 

“And in a few months, I’ll be in a bloody monastery.” Aziraphale dabs at his lips, thinks the dispute settled. “Like you said, no one can be a pirate forever.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next one on the 8/11

**Author's Note:**

> This was meant to be a two-chapter story that then grew legs and ate me whole. I've recently finished a three hundred page fic and promised my poor hands that we wouldn't do that again for at least another year. 
> 
> This is over a hundred pages. It's all written, just not all edited. 
> 
> Each chapter will be put up a week after the last. So the next one will be 7/21. 
> 
> Also, this EARNS its explicit tag in the next chapter.


End file.
